Note Tells of Enron Suicide's Pain and Despair

The anguish of the former Enron vice-chairman who killed himself in January was revealed yesterday when the police released the contents of his suicide note.

John Clifford Baxter wrote that he had lost his sense of pride. He died from a single gunshot wound to the head and was found in his car, half a mile from his home in Sugar Land, an affluent suburb of Houston, Texas.

The brief intimate note was addressed to his wife Carol and provided no further clue to the collapse of the scandal-hit energy company.

It read: "I am so sorry for this. I feel I just can't go on. I've always tried to do the right thing, but where there was once great pride, now it's gone. I love you and the children so much. I just can't be any good to you or myself. The pain is overwhelming. Please try to forgive me. Cliff."

Baxter's family tried to prevent publication of the note, pleading their right to privacy. But the Texas attorney general, John Cornyn, ruled in favour publication, "given the substantial public interest in the causes of Enron's failure and its far-reaching consequences".

Baxter, 43 when he died, left Enron in May last year, seven months before it became the biggest bankruptcy in corporate history.

Like other senior Enron executives he made $35m (£24m) by selling stock. Many of the company's employees, on the other hand, lost their life savings as it careered towards bankruptcy.

Since his death he has been praised as one of the few senior figures to voice concern about Enron's dubious accounting practices.

In a letter written last August the whistleblower Sherren Watkins referred to him as someone with deep reservations about the "veil of secrecy" in the company, and said he had "complained mightily".