REMAINING U.S. CEOs MAKE A BREAK FOR IT

REMAINING U.S. CEOs MAKE A BREAK FOR IT
6/26/02 Associated Press Wire

Band of Roving Chief Executives Spotted Miles from Mexican Border
San Antonio, Texas (Rooters) -


Unwilling to wait for their eventual indictments, the 10,000 remaining CEOs
of public U.S. companies made a break for it yesterday, heading for the
Mexican border, plundering towns and villages along the way, and writing the
entire rampage off as a marketing expense.


"They came into my home, made me pay for my own TV, then double-booked
the revenues," said Rachel Sanchez of Las Cruces, just north of El
Paso. "Right in front of my daughters."


Calling themselves the CEOnistas, the chief executives were first
spotted last night along the Rio Grande River near Quemado, where they
bought each of the town's 320 residents by borrowing against pension
fund gains. By late this morning, the CEOnistas had arbitrarily
inflated Quemado's population to 960, and declared a 200 percent profit for
the fiscal second quarter.

This morning, the outlaws bought the city of Waco, transferred its
underperforming areas to a private partnership, and sent a bill to
California for $4.5 billion.

Law enforcement officials and disgruntled shareholders riding posse
were noticeably frustrated.

"First of all, they're very hard to find because they always stand
behind their numbers, and the numbers keep shifting," said posse
spokesman Dean Levitt. "And every time we yell 'Stop in the name of
the shareholders!', they refer us to investor relations. I've been on the
phone all damn morning."


"YOU'LL NEVER AUDIT ME ALIVE!"

The pursuers said they have had some success, however, by preying on a
common executive weakness. "Last night we caught about 24 of them by
disguising one of our female officers as a CNBC anchor," said U.S.
Border Patrol spokesperson Janet Lewis. "It was like moths to a
flame."


Also, teams of agents have been using high-powered listening devices
to scan the plains for telltale sounds of the CEOnistas. "Most of the
time we just hear leaves rustling or cattle flicking their tails," said
Lewis, "but occasionally we'll pick up someone saying, 'I was totally
out of the loop on that.'"

Among former and current CEOs apprehended with this method were
Computer Associates' Sanjay Kumar, Adelphia's John Rigas, Enron's Ken Lay,
Joseph Nacchio of Qwest, Joseph Berardino of Arthur Andersen, and every
Global Crossing CEO since 1997. ImClone Systems' Sam Waksal and Dennis
Kozlowski of Tyco were not allowed to join the CEOnistas as they have
already been indicted.

So far, about 50 chief executives have been captured, including Martha
Stewart, who was detained south of El Paso where she had cut through a
barbed-wire fence at the Zaragosa border crossing off Highway 375.

"She would have gotten away, but she was stopping motorists to ask for
marzipan and food coloring so she could make edible snowman place
settings, using the cut pieces of wire for the arms," said Border
Patrol officer Jennette Cushing. "We put her in cell No. 7, because the
morning sun really adds texture to the stucco walls."

While some stragglers are believed to have successfully crossed into
Mexico, Cushing said the bulk of the CEOnistas have holed themselves
up at the Alamo.

"No, not the fort, the car rental place at the airport," she said.
"They're rotating all the tires on the minivans and accounting for
each change as a sale."