Black Edge: Inside Information, Dirty Money, and the Quest to Bring Down the Most Wanted Man on Wall Street

by Sheelah Kolhatkar

The most critical thing was to appear relaxed. Squirming, Hollander recalled, picking lint off your clothes, or fiddling with your eyeglasses all could signal that you were lying. He tried to avoid saying words like honestly or frankly, which were common signifiers of dishonesty.

People accused of serious crimes are often in personal turmoil. They have trouble sleeping, sometimes resort to drugs, and have to juggle all sorts of related crises, money problems, angry significant others, anxiety disorders.

Even though the people involved in those kinds of cases were often committing heinous crimes, murdering and extorting and stealing from vulnerable people, Weitzman observed that they operated by a code that said you did not betray your friends and family. The bonds of loyalty were strong. In the Wall Street cases, by contrast, people turned on one another with very little prompting. There was no code at all, nothing beyond a shared lust for making money. Freeman hewed to type. He barely hesitated before flipping on Longueuil, who had been the best man at his wedding.