The Fleece | Chapter 9

"I stood in my closet this morning for ten minutes. Couldn't put the suit on. Grabbed this instead."

Richard pulled at the fleece he was wearing.

"I think it's my brother's. From a ski trip."

He was sixty-two and had spent thirty-one years building a wealth management firm in Century City. He had made a very good living there.

And yes, he owned a closet full of Zegna suits. (I think he called them his armor, which I had never heard before or since!)

For nearly four years, Richard had been moving client funds through accounts his partners did not know about and collecting fees he had convinced himself were a rounding error. Then came a compliance audit. Then came a federal wire fraud indictment.

"I know I did it," he said. "I'm not here to say otherwise. I mean, I did it. I just don't know what's left, man."

A wife, children, his intelligence; I could have started listing what remained, but it was too early. He knew it anyway.

Mostly, he talked about what he used to have.

"What I used to have and didn't appreciate," he said.

He went through the firm, clients, money, his reputation and even the Zegna suits he could no longer put on without standing in the closet for ten minutes first.

That brought me back to UBS.

When UBS fired me on January 15, 2005, two security guards walked me out of the building. I went home and stared at my business cards for three hours.

Justin Paperny, Vice President, UBS Financial Services.

For years as a defendant, I talked about my old job, the clients I served and the business I had done. I called the fraud "bad judgment," "a lapse" and "a few unfortunate decisions." I was the king of euphemisms.

Mostly, I sat around, ate, smoked and waited for my lawyers to fix everything. I spent a great deal of time thinking about the life I used to have. Very little time on what I could still do.

Richard knew that story. He had watched several of my videos and read Lessons From Prison and Ethics in Motion.

"I know at some point you're going to introduce a philosopher I've never heard of," he said.

"How do you know you haven't heard of him? You're a smart dude."

"I have a feeling. Plus, I read Lessons From Prison and Ethics in Motion. What else you got?"

I took a sip of coffee.

"Ever heard of Boethius?"

"No."

"Good. I've got about ten minutes of material here."

Fortune's Wheel

Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius was a Roman senator, consul, scholar and translator who became one of the most powerful men serving under King Theodoric. He had done very well for himself until he was accused of treason, thrown in prison and executed around 524 AD.

Boethius maintained that he was innocent. While waiting to die, he wrote The Consolation of Philosophy, which became one of the most widely read books of the Middle Ages.

"From a prison cell?"

"Yes."

"You're going to tell me what I should do when I'm in a prison cell?"

"I'm going to tell you what he figured out. What you do with it is up to you."

Boethius wrote the book as a conversation between himself and Lady Philosophy. She visits him in his cell (a literary character; I did not want Richard thinking Boethius was hallucinating while awaiting execution).

Boethius complains. He had been a respected statesman with money, rank and access to power. Now he was locked in a cell, facing death and asking how Fortune could do this to him.

Lady Philosophy tells him Fortune had always behaved this way. She gave him money, position and influence. Boethius accepted all of it. Now the wheel had turned.

Boethius wrote:

"This is my art, this the game I never cease to play. I turn the wheel that spins. I delight to see the high come down and the low ascend."

"So the consolation is what?" Richard asked. "That I should've seen this coming?"

"The consolation is that you were never going to control how long you kept everything."

He gave me a look. It was not connecting.

I tried again.

Boethius had accepted Fortune when she gave him money, rank and access. Once she took them away, he called her unjust. Lady Philosophy reminded him that the wheel keeps moving.

Richard had enjoyed many good years. He built a firm, earned money, raised a family and became known for his work. Now he was under indictment and looking backward at all of it. Of course he missed it. He had spent most of our conversation there.

Richard had spent thirty-one years building the firm. I was not going to tell him none of it mattered because a Roman philosopher wrote about a wheel fifteen hundred years ago. He would have thought I was insane (and I might have agreed with him).

His firm, clients, family and reputation mattered to him, and he could lose all of it.

"I always assumed what I built was me," he said.

Richard Was Not Boethius

There was a problem with my lecture.

Boethius claimed he was innocent. Richard had already admitted moving client funds and collecting the fees.

Fortune did not move the money.

He called the fees a rounding error. That did not make them one. He had helped clients and spent thirty-one years building the firm. He had also moved money through accounts his partners did not know about for nearly four years.

He had to discuss all of it: the years building the firm, the clients he helped, the secret accounts and the fees. He could not blame the final four years on Fortune.

The indictment was more than bad luck at the bottom of a wheel. Breaking the law has consequences, sometimes enormous ones. His license, money, reputation and freedom were at risk because of decisions he made.

He knew that. He kept returning to what he used to have, perhaps because those years had already happened and he knew how to describe them. He had no idea what came next.

He did not know what would happen to the firm or his license. He did not know whether he would go to prison, how long the case would last or what his friends would say when they learned more. Even putting on a suit had become complicated.

That was why I brought up the wheel. Richard's position was changing quickly, and he could not control where it stopped. And no, the wheel did not excuse what he did.

Richard also understood exactly how I had wasted my years as a defendant. I had already given him a very long example of what not to do.

"What does Boethius say you're supposed to build instead?" Richard asked.

"He spends a lot of pages answering that. Wisdom, virtue, reason, how you respond. Family and friendship too. That's my ten-minute version."

"That makes more sense."

Richard knew the firm's numbers cold. We got into trust and what he planned to do about the crisis he created.

Then we returned to the wheel.

It could turn again. Maybe Richard would keep his license, find a different career, repair some relationships or simply get through the case without spending every morning trapped in his closet. I had no idea, and telling him otherwise would be a lie.

For now, he had to live without an answer. Federal cases are unpredictable. A call from counsel, a filing or a conversation with the government can change what a defendant believes will happen; then a week, a month or even years can pass with no news. Richard could not spend every day guessing where the wheel would stop.

For more than three years, that is exactly what I did. I waited for lawyers to call and hoped the next development would restore some piece of my old life. When it did not, I complained, ate and waited again. I reached sentencing as a total basket case. It prepared me for nothing.

Richard still had to decide how he would spend his time while the case continued. Nothing he did would erase the crime. It took me years to admit that.

Chapter 9 Reflection Journal

Fortune gave Boethius rank, wealth and access. What has Fortune put in your hands that you started treating as yours forever?

Richard's behavior helped turn his wheel. Which consequences came from circumstances outside your control, and which began with decisions you made?

How much time are you spending talking about what you used to have?

If you do not know how your case ends, what can you still do today?