Carpenter et al. v. United States (484 U.S. 19)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided November 16, 1987 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 484 U.S. 19 · 108 S. Ct. 316
- Decided
- November 16, 1987
- Term
- October Term 1987
- Vote
- 8–0
- Majority author
- Justice White
- Issue area
- Criminal Procedure
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Justice White delivered the opinion of the Court. Petitioners Kenneth Felis and R. Foster Winans were convicted of violating § 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, 48 Stat. 891, 15 U. S. C. §78j(b), and Rule 10b-5, 17 CFR §240.10b-5 (1987). United States v. Winans, 612 F. Supp. 827 (SDNY 1985). They were also found guilty of violating the federal mail and wire fraud statutes, 18 U. S. C. §§ 1341, 1343, and were convicted for conspiracy under 18 U. S. C. §371. Petitioner David Carpenter, Winans’ roommate, was convicted for aiding and abetting. With a minor exception, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed, 791 F. 2d 1024 (1986); we granted certiorari, 479 U. S. 1016 (1986). I In 1981, Winans became a reporter for the Wall Street Journal (the Journal) and in the summer of 1982 became one of the two writers of a daily column, “Heard on the Street.” That column discussed selected stocks or groups of stocks, giving positive and negative information about those stocks and taking “a point of view with respect to investment in the stocks that it reviews.” 612 F. Supp., at 830. Winans regularly interviewed corporate executives to put together interesting perspectives on the stocks that would be highlighted in upcoming columns, but, at least for the columns at issue here, none contained corporate inside information or any “hold for release” information. Id., at…
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