He could have easily disappeared with the money. Nobody knew he had it, and is reasonable to believe the Kettleman's would have claimed innocence through the trial; especially without the money.
As irrational as the Kettlemans were I don't think they would have passed up on the opportunity to get revenge against Jimmy at no additional cost to themselves, especially if it meant lowering their sentence.
They'd have been hard up finding a lawyer to represent them going to court with a non-guilty claim anyway, when even Jimmy wouldn't.
There's also a risk that they would have tried seeking some other retaliation against Jimmy. Especially when they could have hired a thug like Nacho to get the money back if it meant sharing a part of it. I'd have been very nervous about that in such a situation. Not worth the risk.
Perknose said:
Is it the writers pointing out the inner scumbag within us all, a la Walter White? After all, White could have walked away at several points with all the money he'd ever need, but chose not to.
That's true, but at least with Walt we could see a more gradual descent. And it was always obvious that his bitterness and pettiness was deep seated and fundamental to who he was, while Jimmy seemed to legitimately overcome his identity as a scammer. Had Walt ever walked away he would have still been the loser high school chemistry teacher (or disgraced ex-teacher) who was facing imminent death without ever making a name for himself. What money he was known to have brought on was based on a superficial lie. As Heisenberg he was a criminal but at least he was somebody, feared and even respected. Although he did eventually walk away from that, maybe to protect his family, but I think the real reason is because making meth had become mundane and was no longer this constant source of danger that made him feel alive. He always cared about how this impacted his family, but until that point he would have seen his meth dealings as irrelevant, both with his son who had no idea and his wife who was already a lost cause.
In Jimmy's case, it at least seems like he would have been more respected and valued had he stayed on the legitimate path. He's throwing away what relationships he has.
Maybe I'm reading too much into this, as the ending showed he simply didn't want to work with this major law firm. But it also came right after he went on about how much he resented not stealing a bunch of money. I wish the angle was more along the lines of him wanting to lift himself up by the bootstraps and do things on his own terms, maybe seeing the big firms as corrupt and inefficient. There was a lot of potential for a gray area or rationalization even as Saul, where he could say he was supporting people who were discarded by society and whom the big names didn't give a crap about. He could reflect on how lawyers like Chuck talk a lot about integrity and the sanctity of the law but are actually dishonest and manipulative at their core and will give people a raw deal because they don't size up right.
Instead it looks like he's just addicted to being a criminal for the sake of being a criminal and the rush of cheating people.
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