The jury in the trial of former Enron chief executives Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling began its fifth day of deliberations yesterday to decide whether both men are guilty of fraud and conspiracy at the collapsed energy trader.

The eight women and four men of the panel have given little indication about which way they could be leaning, but US District Judge Sim Lake said on Tuesday that the jury had decided it would not deliberate on Friday of this week or on Monday, the Memorial Day holiday.

Mr Lay (64) and Mr Skilling, (52) are charged with lying to investors and employees to hide the financial disarray at the company they built from a sleepy pipeline operator into an international energy giant.

Enron's downfall from its peak as the seventh-largest US company into bankruptcy in December 2001 shocked Wall Street, which had long been enamoured of Enron as a market innovator.

Mr Lay faces six counts of conspiracy and fraud in the case, and Mr Skilling faces 28 counts of conspiracy, fraud and insider trading.

Mr Lay and Mr Skilling, who have denied any wrongdoing, face decades in prison if convicted.

Judge Lake will render a verdict in the separate bench trial of Mr Lay that concluded on Tuesday in which the former chief executive and chairman is charged with illegally using money from $75 million (€58.75 million) in personal bank loans to buy stock.

"Now it's in the hands of the judge, the hands of the jury and the hands of God," Mr Lay told reporters as he left the courthouse on Tuesday.