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| Wilson Applauds President Signing of Landmark Corporate Accountability Legislation |
July 30, 2002 |
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| Washington, DC - Congresswoman Heather Wilson today applauded the signing of tougher corporate reporting and accounting standards by the President of the United States. President Bush signed the bill into law in a ceremony at the White House.
“We’ve had some companies led by greedy people who cooked the books aided by accountants who dishonored their profession. That’s fraud and some people should go to jail for it,” said Wilson. “They tried to work around the system, so now we are going to tighten down some of the rules of the system to make sure this can’t happen again. It’s time we do something to restore America’s confidence in business and restore confidence in the overall economy.”
The Corporate and Auditing Accountability, Responsibility, and Transparency Act includes the following provisions:
Increases criminal penalties for a broad array of white-collar crimes (including 20 years for document shredding and obstruction of justice), freezes extraordinary payments to employees of companies under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission and makes it a crime to retaliate against corporate whistleblowers;
Creates a Public Company Accounting Oversight Board to enforce auditing, quality control, and independence standards and rules. Fees charged to all publicly traded companies will fund the board;
Enhances corporate disclosure, including immediate disclosure of any information affecting the material health of the company;
Ensures investors who have lost money in the markets as a result of corporate malfeasance receive compensation from any legal settlement.
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