So Richard Causey, Enron's former chief accounting officer, has been sentenced to 5 1/2 years for his role in the scandal.

That's 18 months less than the seven year maximum he agreed to serve when he did the last-minute plea in December to avoid trial.

Still, it's six months less than the company's chief financial officer Andrew Fastow. And nowhere near the 24 years-plus sentence handed down to Enron's former chief executive Jeff Skilling.

As Loren Steffy says in the Houston Chronicle, the shadow of Fastow was lingering nearby when the man who rubber-stamped Enron's crooked figures was sentenced.

"By all accounts, Fastow is a changed man and his remorse sincere, but his sentence has lowered the ceiling for all Enron defendants save Skilling,'' Steffy writes.

"How could anyone other than Skilling deserve more time than Fastow, the guy who admitted to lying, to stealing from the company, to using his own children in his schemes and to allowing his wife to go to prison to help himself?"

Meanwhile Skilling will start his prison sentence in Minnesota on December 12, according to news reports.

Skilling had originally asked to be sent to FCI Butner, a medium security prison located in North Carolina where he would have joined Jonathan Pollard, a former civilian Navy analyst serving a life sentence for passing classified information to Israel, and former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, R-Calif., who's serving a sentence for accepting bribes.

Skilling has also dropped his opposition to a separate million settlement that ex-Enron employees closer to $85 million.