Forbes has a cover story on how Steve Jobs got himself in hot water with the SEC over stock options. The magazine is part-owned by former Apple CFO Fred Anderson. Do the math.

It may be time to put a cork in Silicon Valley's most famous law firm. Wilson Sonsini is no longer celebrating its new attorneys with champagne. That trimmed perk is just the beginning of its woes.

Nancy Heinen, former general counsel for Apple, has reached a settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission. She neither admits nor denies wrongdoing over charges that she forged board documents to backdate executive stock options — instead, she gets to avoid a trial. Heinen also agrees to pay $2.2 million and is barred from serving as an officer of a public company or practicing law before the SEC for five years. Who will sculpt a bust wreathed with laurels in the honor of a woman who so courageously fell on her sword for tyrant CEO Steve Jobs? [WSJ]

Last Friday, shareholder plaintiffs filed suit against San Jose District Court against Apple CEO Steve Jobs, former CFO Fred Anderson, ex-general counsel Nancy Heinen, and members of the company's board of directors looking to reclaim the $7 billion in lost stock value when the company restated its financials in the wake of a — let's say it — hopelessly boring stock-option scandal that takedown-hungry journalists cared about far more than their readers. Let's be real: If anyone really cared about Jobs's fudging of stock-options grant dates, would it have taken so long to drum up some outraged shareholders? This smells of bored lawyers. The old-news complaint:

Nevermind the multiple witnesses to Broadcom co-founder Henry Nicholas' drug and prostitute habit. Nevermind the $2 billion restatement of earnings by Broadcom over backdated stock options. Dr. Henry T. Nicholas, still worth $2 billion himself while staying at a $60,000 plus substance abuse treatment clinic in Malibu under bond has plead not guilty to the charges listed in various federal indictments. A jury trial will commence on July 29th, with Nicholas joining co-founder Henry Samueli, former CFO William Ruehle and general counsel David Dull as defendants possibly taking the stand to describe their logical actions as sober and conscientious executives just doing their fiduciary duty to shareholders. I hate to try people outside the judicial system, but seriously, does anyone see any consequence beyond the lightest "club fed" sentence for these guys if found guilty?

After the SEC accused Henry Nicholas and Henry Samueli, founders of chipmaker Broadcom, of illegally backdating stock options for five years, Samueli stepped down as board chairman and CTO. Nicholas had stepped down from his post as CEO in 2003 amidst allegations of having a drug habit and flying friends and prostitutes from around the country to an underground party lair he'd built in his home.

Federal prosecutors allege former Monster.com president and COO James Treacy bolstered the value of his company stock options through illegal backdating, which is when executives retroactively fix the books so it looks like they were granted company shares at a lower value than where they actually traed, increasing their take when they sell. Treacy received a total of $23 million exercising his company stock options but about $13.5 million came from "the in-the-money portion of backdated option grants," prosecutors allege. The Securities and Exchange Commission filed seperate charges against Treacy. "Mr. Treacy is completely innocent of these charges and looks forward to being vindicated at trial," his lawyer told the WSJ. And really, how can you not trust a mug like his?

The stock-options backdating scandal, which bored Silicon Valley the day the SEC first announced its investigations, continues. The latest to disclose a brush with the law: Google. Google has not been accused of misleading investors by moving up the grant date of stock options, making them more profitable for the executives who received them. But Google board member Ann Mather, the former CFO of animation studio Pixar, has, and the SEC is now initiating legal proceedings against her.

The founder and chairman of semiconductor equipment maker KLA-Tencor retired today over a stock option backdating scandal. Kenneth Levy (pictured) had been with the company for over 20 years. KLA will re-price backdated options that he and other KLA executives hold. The Wall Street Journal notes that a May article in that paper sparked the options probe.

• First, a refresher: Backdating stock options really means giving an investor stock options below the current stock price, thus making them immediately worth money (as the recipient could buy stock at the low price and immediately sell it for a profit). Companies do this by pretending the stocks were given earlier when the stock was at the lower price. It's illegal if documents are forged, the company doesn't tell shareholders, or the company doesn't properly reduce reported earnings in its financial statements or taxes. [University of Iowa]

Cablevision Systems Corp., the fifth-largest U.S. cable-television provider, awarded stock options to a dead executive in 1999, then backdated them to give the illusion they were granted when he was alive.

Oh, the move the New York Times is alluding to is a stock options backdating scandal, whereby ex-Comverse head Jacob Alexander allegedly manipulated his stock options illegally in America, netting himself tens of millions of dollars.