Jeffrey Skilling, the former CEO of Enron Corp., was sentenced to 24 years and four months in prison Monday for his role in orchestrating the events leading to one of the biggest corporate scandals in U.S. history.

U.S. District Judge Sim Lake told Skilling to wear an ankle monitor and ordered him into home confinement, pending a decision about where he should serve his sentence.

Former Enron CEO Jeff Skilling, right, arrives at the federal courthouse in Houston with his attorney, Daniel Petrocelli, left, for his sentencing hearing, Monday, Oct. 23, 2006.
(David J. Phillip/Associated Press)

Skilling's sentencing came after a steady parade of victims told a Houston courtroom how the collapse of the once high-flying company had devastated their lives.  

Skilling, 52, was found guilty in May on 19 of the 28 charges he faced: one count of conspiracy, one count of insider trading, five counts of making false statements and 12 counts of securities fraud. He was acquitted on nine counts of insider trading.

Co-accused Kenneth Lay, the founder of Enron, was found guilty of six counts of fraud and conspiracy but died of heart failure in July, before he could be sentenced. Because he died before having had a chance to appeal, a federal judge last week ordered the convictions vacated.

The Skilling sentence is the most severe handed out to any Enron exec and falls just short of the 25-year term handed to former Worldcom CEO Bernie Ebbers.

Collapse wiped out $60B in market value

Enron's bankruptcy in December 2001 — at that time, the biggest in U.S. corporate history — followed revelations that it had hidden huge losses by using fraudulent partnership deals. The losses were kept off the company's balance sheet.

After the losses were revealed, the company's stock plunged, wiping out $60 billion US in stock market value and throwing 5,600 Enron employees out of work.

Enron became a poster child for the wave of accounting malfeasance that shook investor confidence in corporate America in the early years of this decade.

The Enron and Worldcom debacles eventually led to a toughening of regulatory requirements dealing with the reporting of financial results.