Reviewers Praise for Den of Thieves:
A must read.... There is intrigue, suspense, mystery, crime, penance and repentance. Careers rise and fall. The players are fascinating.... James Stewart recounts much that we need to know.
New York Law Journal
Presents in one eye-opening saga what the multitudes of news reports only could hint.
St. Petersburg Times
As good a book on Wall Street as I have ever read.... It is a fine, spicy tale. But to stop at that is to miss the books importance: it at long last gives us a full and true record of systemic criminal behavior in the financial markets.
Michael Thomas, The New York Times
Packed with scenes of high drama, the narrative often moves at breakneck speed... a wealth of fascinating minutiae .
Business Week
Fascinating... the most damning evidence yet compiled about why there will be no heroes among the 80s moneymen... a masterpiece... will stand as the definitive history of the financial depredations of the decade... a work of reportage verging on history.
The New Republic
A rollicking account of the insider trading and market manipulation scandals of the 1980s.
Los Angeles Times
Stewarts tale is like a novel you cant put down but wish would end because it is so disturbing... Its a story of the decadea revealing, disturbing tale of what can happen when greed runs rampant.
The Seattle Times
A fascinating account of the financial scandals that culminated in 1990.... Blends narration and exposition so that we can follow the intricacies of finance and financial law without effort.
The New Yorker
As The Wall Street Journal reporter who covered the story, Stewart was uniquely situated to write this book, which will doubtless become the standard work. He gained an extraordinary grasp of the names, events and mind-numbing complexities.
The Houston Post
The definitive account of the insider-trading scandal.
Chicago Tribune
[Stewart] delivers the collection of oddballs, dirtbags, and greed-heads with a sturdy moral sense, always sensitive to the ambiguities of the events he describes.
Fortune
Den of Thieves is the best book so far on the Whoring Eighties.
Newsweek
Battling through shrouds of secrecy, Mr. Stewart has done a masterful job of linking together the chief players in this lurid drama.
The Economist
If you doubt the culpability of this crew, get thee to a bookstore. Stewarts exhaustive research proves that Levine, Siegel, Boesky, Milken and a busload of their colleagues were nothing more than high-priced thieves.
The Miami Herald
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Contents
FOR JANE, MY SISTER;
MICHAEL, MY BROTHER;
AND FOR KATE
And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves.
And said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves.
MATTHEW 21:12-13
King James Edition
Cast of Characters
As crime on Wall Street neared its climax, late 1985.
AT KIDDER, PEABODY & Co., New York
Martin Siegel, investment banker
Ralph DeNunzio, chief executive
Al Gordon, chairman
John T. Roche, president
Robert Krantz, counsel
Richard Wigton, head of arbitrage
Timothy Tabor, arbitrageur
Peter Goodson, head of M&A
John Gordon, investment banker
Hal Ritch, investment banker
AT IVAN F. BOESKY CORPORATION, New York
Ivan F. Boesky, arbitrageur
Stephen Conway, investment banker
Lance Lessman, head of research
Michael Davidoff, head trader
Reid Nagle, chief financial officer
Setrag Mooradian, chief accountant
AT DREXEL BURNHAM LAMBERT INC., Beverly Hills
Michael R. Milken, head of high-yield securities
Lowell Milken, lawyer
Richard Sandler, lawyer
James Dahl, salesman
Gary Winnick, salesman
Warren Trepp, head trader
Terren Peizer, trader
Cary Maultasch, trader
Bruce Newberg, trader
Charles Thurnher, accountant
Lorraine Spurge, administrator
Lisa Ann Jones, trading assistant
AT DREXEL BURNHAM LAMBERT INC., New York
Dennis B. Levine, investment banker
Fred Joseph, chief executive
Donald Engel, consultant
Stephen Weinroth, investment banker
David Kay, co-head of M&A
Leon Black, co-head of M&A
AT GOLDMAN, SACHS & CO., New York
Robert Freeman, head of arbitrage
Robert Rubin, future co-chief executive
Frank Brosens, arbitrageur
David Brown, investment banker
AT LAZARD FRRES, New York
Robert Wilkis, investment banker
Randall Cecola, analyst
Felix Rohatyn, investment banker
AT SHEARSON LEHMAN BROTHERS, New York
Ira Sokolow, investment banker
J. Tomilson Hill III, co-head of M&A
Steve Waters, co-head of M&A
Peter Solomon, investment banker
AT BANK LEU, Nassau, the Bahamas
Bernhard Meier, banker
Bruno Pletscher, banker
AT MERRILL LYNCH & CO., New York
Stephen Hammerman, general counsel
Richard Drew, vice president, compliance
Major investors
Carl Icahn, corporate raider and future chairman of TWA
John Mulheren, head of Jamie Securities
Henry Kravis, principal, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts Inc.
AT WACHTELL, LIPTON, ROSEN & KATZ, New York (counsel for Goldman, Sachs)
Martin Lipton, partner
Ilan Reich, partner
Lawrence Pedowitz, partner
AT PAUL, WEISS, RIFKIND, WHARTON & GARRISON, New York (counsel for Michael Milken and Dennis Levine)
Arthur Liman, partner
Martin Flumenbaum, partner
AT WILLIAMS & CONNOLLY, Washington, D.C. (counsel for Michael Milken)
Edward Bennett Williams, partner
Robert Litt, partner
AT CAHILL, GORDON & REINDEL, New York (counsel for Drexel Burnham)
Irwin Schneiderman, partner
Thomas Curnin, partner
AT FRIED, FRANK, HARRIS, SHRIVER & JACOBSON, New York and Washington (counsel for Boesky)
Harvey Pitt, partner
Leon Silverman, partner
AT MUDGE ROSE GUTHRIE ALEXANDER & FERDON, New York (counsel for Siegel; later at Fried Frank)
Jed Rakoff, partner
Audrey Strauss, partner
AT ROBINSON, LAKE, LERER & MONTGOMERY, New York (public relations advisors for Michael Milken)
Linda Robinson, partner
Kenneth Lerer, partner
AT THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEYS OFFICE, New York
Rudolph Giuliani, U.S. attorney
Benito Romano, deputy to Giuliani, future U.S. attorney
Charles Carberry, assistant U.S. attorney, future head of fraud unit
Bruce Baird, assistant U.S. attorney, future head of fraud unit
John Carroll, assistant U.S. attorney
Jess Fardella, assistant U.S. attorney
AT THE SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION, Washington, D.C.
John Shad, chairman
Gary Lynch, chief of enforcement
John Sturc, assistant chief of enforcement
Leo Wang, attorney
Peter Sonnenthal, attorney
Prologue
Martin A. Siegel hurried through Washington, D.C.s, National Airport and slipped into a phone booth near the Eastern shuttle gates. For years now, phone booths, often at airports, had served as his de facto offices. He complained often about his long hours and frequent absences from his wife and three children, but the truth was that he thrived on his pressure-filled life as one of the countrys leading investment bankers.
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