It's too early to tell whether employees and other investors in the Enron Corporation will gain some restitution for the alleged misdeeds of accounting giant Arthur Andersen in the wake of the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history.

But after an aggressive legal effort by Arizona Attorney General Janet Napolitano, victims of the largest nonprofit bankruptcy in U.S. history will get a big chunk of money back from Andersen.

Last week Napolitano (our New Dem of the Week on NDOL.org), representing the State of Arizona, announced a settlement whereby Arthur Anderson will pony up $217 million to defrauded investors in the Baptist Foundation of Arizona, with Andersen accepting responsibility for misleading audits. The Foundation went belly up in 1999, leaving 13,000 small investors with an estimated $570 million to $590 million in losses. The settlement Napolitano secured from Andersen, along with the Foundation's remaining assets, will together ensure that investors get back more than 80 percent of their lost dollars.

Two leading Andersen auditors in this case agreed to give up their CPA licenses in Arizona, and a special oversight panel of the Arizona Accountancy Board will monitor the firm itself.

The parallels with the Enron case are striking: like Enron, the Baptist Foundation hid huge losses in off-balance-sheet ventures. And as was the case with Enron, Andersen was supplying consulting as well as auditing services.

For all the headline-ready parallels with the Enron case, Napolitano herself views the settlement as just another case in her longstanding fight for crime victims' rights. "These investors, many of whom are elderly, trusted the misleading financial statements audited by Andersen," she said. "This agreement will allow Baptist Foundation victims to at least recover most of their investment."

As participants in last year's DLC National Conversation in Indianapolis may remember, Napolitano spoke passionately about victims' rights as representing a fulfillment of the New Democrat ethos of personal and mutual responsibility. While most of her prior work has involved victims of violent crime (especially sexual assault), she recognizes that white-collar crime creates victims as well.

As the old saying goes, "Some people will rob you with a six-gun, and others with a fountain pen." Both types of bad guys must be brought to justice, and their victims given restitution for their losses.