Editorial: Bad end to the romance

R. Allen Stanford and James M. Davis won't be romancing Memphis anymore.

Stanford's 110-year prison sentence, doled out last week after he was convicted on 13 fraud-related charges for bilking investors out of $7 billion over two decades, means Stanford won't be showing up anymore at high-profile events to charm high-visibility Memphians.

Neither will his cohort in crime, Davis, who ran the Stanford Financial Group's offices in Memphis out of the Crescent Center. He's facing years in prison as well, even though he pleaded guilty and became a star witness for the prosecution of Stanford.

But sending these scoundrels off to the slammer won't erase the unsightly stain Stanford Financial left in Memphis. Stanford's reckless, dishonest investment schemes touched many of the city's best-known and most respected people and institutions.

Over the past decade Stanford and Davis cozied up to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, FedEx and the PGA Tour, along with dozens of high-wealth, high-profile Memphians. Exactly how many millions Stanford and Davis conned out of Memphis isn't fully known. But it was a lot.

Yes, Memphis can recover. But there is a lesson here for Memphis: never be duped again by somebody who promises the moon and tries to buy his way into respectability.