Pied Piper Ed Peters

Meet Ed Peters, former District Attorney of Hinds County, Mississippi. He and others were involved in a bribery and influencing ring with a Mississippi State Judge. Some of the other ring members are in prison and the judge has been indicted.

The Rove Republican Racket is using him to go after successful Democratic fund-raisers like Paul Minor and politicians in a State well-known for their hateful persecution of "those of a different political persuasion."

Now come the news from reliable sources that the sweetheart deal Ed Peters received by the Rove Racket, including full immunity and only partial payment of a $1 million bribery payoff, is being closely reviewed. Prosecutorial misconduct? Most likely.

Like the Pied Piper, Peters has sung ambitious Assistant U.S. Attorneys down a dangerous path to save himself and provide another embarrassing episode in a state many call "backwards."

Liars and Alice H. Martin

As we mentioned in our previous post, the Rove Racket lost its case against former HealthSouth CEO Richard Scrushy for accounting improprieties and fraud.

One of the top prosecutors of this failed case was none other than embattled U.S. Attorney Alice H. Martin. Martin has excelled at establishing herself as one of the top prosecutors of "political corruption." The truth is "political corruption" is a cover for "political persecution" of Democrats. Martin is the same one who targeted Sue Schmitz. Remember, it took two trials to convict Schmitz.

Now a civil case is spotlighting the details on why Martin and the Rove Republican Racket lost this case. From the Birmingham News:

Lawyers for Richard Scrushy said in their closing statements of his civil trial the former HealthSouth Corp. chief executive was torpedoed by dishonest subordinates. Jim Parkman told Jefferson Circuit Judge Allwin Horn shareholders for the company put on witnesses who had already pleaded guilty to the fraud at the Birmingham-based company. "Bill Owens was the architect of the fraud," Parkman said, speaking of the the company's former chief financial officer, who is imprisoned after pleading guilty. "He has lied and lied." Parkman also said two witnesses -- former Scrushy bodyguard Jim Goodreau and former HealthSouth in-house lawyer Bill Horton -- gave testimony in Scrushy's favor. Goodreau, a former Alabama State Trooper, and Horton, a lawyer in good standing, should be believed over the five former CFOs who pleaded guilty and blame Scrushy, he said.

No Knowledge

When federal prosecutors failed to convict CEO Richard Scrushy on charges related to an accounting scandal at HealthSouth, the Rove Republican Racket went after him in other ways: political persecution.

The Rove Racket appears to have tossed the book at Scrushy and former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman as vengeance and retaliation for losing their original case.

The second case, involving a bogus stretch of law, accused the respected Democratic Governor of offering a regulatory position to Scrushy after Scrushy made a significant public donation. Although there was no quid pro quo, the Rove Racket went after the Democratic leader and CEO, and convicted them.

Yesterday, Scrushy made his first public comments on the HealthSouth scandal. Scrushy was acquitted on all charges in 2005. From The Wall Street Journal:

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- Richard M. Scrushy, former chairman and chief executive of HealthSouth Corp., said he had "no knowledge" of the $2.6 billion fraud that nearly destroyed the rehabilitation company he founded, in his first public testimony on the matter. Mr. Scrushy, who was acquitted of criminal charges related to the HealthSouth accounting scandal in 2005, took the witness stand Wednesday in the trial of a civil action against him by HealthSouth shareholders. The former CEO, who is serving a prison term in an unrelated case, didn't testify publicly during the five-month HealthSouth criminal trial. In Wednesday's testimony, the 56-year-old Mr. Scrushy sought repeatedly to distance himself from the five chief financial officers who served under him at HealthSouth, all of whom pleaded guilty in connection with the fraud. They have testified that Mr. Scrushy was complicit in systematically overstating HealthSouth's earnings in a scheme that spanned about six years. "I certainly had no knowledge of anything they were doing in terms of moving numbers around in the company," Mr. Scrushy testified Wednesday. The former CEO, who wore a dark-gray suit with a burgundy tie, and occasionally donned wire-rimmed glasses to read financial documents, said HealthSouth employed the auditing company that is now Ernst & Young at great expense, to ensure that its books were properly reviewed. He also underscored measures he said he implemented to ensure "moral and ethical" behavior at HealthSouth, such as creating a compliance program in its early days.

UPDATE: Blame Game in Nebraska

We finally heard the recording of the Nebraska Supreme Court hearing regarding the wrongful seizure of Louis Obad's Las Vegas bound money.

We wrote about this incident in early April.

In the hearing, State officials are blaming dual jurisdiction issues on why the Rove Racket's U.S. Attorney's Office in Nebraska had the right to seize Mr. Obad's money.

Remember, Mr. Obad never committed a crime. He simply was driving cross-country to Las Vegas and was pulled over for speeding. The Rove Racket saw over $40,000 and thought they had the right to seize it.

The Nebraska Supreme Court hearing can be heard here.

New Mexico Firing

Tight lipped Karl Rove left his four-hour meeting with federal prosecutors on Friday making no comments. Investigators are looking into the 2006 Rove-Bush firings of nine U.S. Attorneys.

The Washington Times took a couple of paragraphs in its story to revisit the firing of the former U.S. Attorney in New Mexico, David Iglesias.

The internal report concluded that Mr. Rove - along with Monica Goodling, former White House liaison for the Justice Department; former White House official Harriet Miers; and former Sen. Pete V. Domenici, New Mexico Republican - were involved in the "most troubling" firing - that of former New Mexico U.S. Attorney David Iglesias.
Despite Justice Department assertions that Mr. Iglesias was fired because of his job performance, the report concluded that he was removed because New Mexico Republicans complained to the White House and Justice Department about his handling of voter-fraud and public-corruption cases. Mr. Iglesias said Mr. Domenici pressured him to bring corruption charges against a Democratic state lawmaker before the 2006 election. Mr. Domenici has acknowledged calling Mr. Iglesias but said he did not pressure him to bring an indictment. The internal report concluded that an appointed prosecutor could conduct a more extensive investigation because several officials, including Mr. Rove, refused to cooperate. The report said it could not fully determine the role of the White House in the firings but did conclude that it was involved in at least three of the nine dismissals.

Rove to be Interviewed by DOJ Today

The King of the Racket is being interviewed by federal prosecutors of the U.S. Department of Justice. At the time of this posting, Rove's Twitter account hadn't been updated in a day. That's an eternity in Twitterland!

Carrie Johnson of The Washington Post posted a short while ago the following: "[T]he logistics of the interview this morning of former Bush aide Karl Rove remain a little murky. What we do know is that prosecutor Nora Dannehy has traveled to the Georgetown office of Rove's lawyer, Bob Luskin, and that Rove is submitting to an interview regarding any role he played in the decision to fire 9 U.S. attorneys in 2006. Rove will not be able to invoke executive privilege, since the privilege belongs to former President Bush, and Bush agreed to waive these issues for the most part to settle a related case filed by the U.S. House of Representatives earlier this year."

Read the entire chat exchange here.

Laughable

Louis V. Franklin, the paid consultant of the U.S. attorneys office of the Middle District of Alabama, has dispatched a letter requesting a longer prison term for wrongly convicted former Governor of Alabama, Don Siegelman.

According to the Montgomery Advertiser, "Siegelman's attorney, Vince Kilborn, said... it's 'laughable' for prosecut­ors to recommend a tougher sentence than the former governor received before two of the charges he was convicted of were dismissed. 'It's a continuation of gov­ernment overreaching in this case,' Kilborn said."

The Rove Racket is trying to play hardball as they see their political persecution cases weakening in the South and possibly going up in smoke.

Read the full article here.

Bush Appointees Remain

A wonderful website and blog that is a daily read has been added to our scroll and it's called Main Justice. In a recent post, Main Justice focused on the issue of how many Bush Appointees remain at the 93 U.S. Attorney Offices. It is obvious now that the Rove Racket doesn't want to leave.

Here's an excerpt:

So, what’s the state of play on U.S. Attorneys now that the Obama administration has passed the 100-day mark? To answer that, we tried to assemble some hard numbers. To wit: How many Clinton-appointed U.S. Attorneys were still on the job at the end of April 2001? And how many Bush-appointed U.S. Attorneys are still in place now? The answer: Around 53 Bush-appointees are still coming to work at the 93 U.S. Attorney offices around the country, by our count. But at this point eight years ago, only 32 Clinton-appointed prosecutors were still on the job, the DOJ says. That’s a difference of 21. The above tally on Bush-appointed U.S. Attorneys is our own, and it differs somewhat from the numbers reported on the Department of Justice’s Web site. The DOJ puts asterisks next to “presidentially appointed” U.S. Attorneys. What the DOJ really appears to mean is “Senate confirmed” U.S. Attorneys. Unlike the DOJ list, we’ve included in our tally some prosecutors who were appointed during the Bush administration but never confirmed by the Senate, amid turbulence over the politicization of the Bush DOJ. Prosecutors in that category
include Jeffrey A. Taylor in the District of Columbia, who withdrew his nomination under opposition from Democrat Eleanor Holmes Norton, DC’s non-voting delegate to the House. But Taylor has remained on the job under a U.S. District Court appointment.

Didn't Involve

A closer look at yesterday's story by Jerry Mitchell of The Clarion Ledger reveals an important legal argument. The Rove Republican Racket has targeted folks based on a extreme stretch of the law. Here is the important excerpt:

A U.S. House Judiciary Committee has since cited the case as a possible example of selective prosecution, and a three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit recently heard arguments in the case, spending much of its time questioning prosecutors about federal jurisdiction. In a rare move, the judges have posed more questions since, sending lawyers a letter with their follow-up queries. "We're encouraged by their thoughtful questions that would require reversal in Paul Minor's case," said one of his attorneys, Hiram Eastland Jr. of Greenwood. The judges asked how a bribery charge could constitute a federal crime if it didn't involve "any business, transaction, or series of transactions of such organization, government or agency involving any thing of value of $5,000 or more" as required by statute. Judges even asked if they decided to dismiss all four bribery counts, what should be done about the remaining convictions on conspiracy, racketeering and honest services fraud.

If the 5th circuit reverses Paul Minor's conviction, this will end the Racket's persecution of high-ranking politicians for political purposes.

Implications of Paul Minor Case Appeal

Happy Mother's Day!

Today's Jackson Clarion Ledger analysis on the possible implications of the still-awaited decision by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeal on the Paul S. Minor case is a must read.

The Rove Republican Racket may see its political persecution house of cards collapse.

Acquitted

Yesterday, WR Grace was acquitted on all counts.

Why?

Prosecutorial misconduct. The Rove Racket failed again.

The Washington Post writes today, "The defense accused the government of failing to turn over evidence that would have undermined the credibility of a key prosecution witness. At issue were e-mails between the witness and members of the prosecution team. In court papers, the Justice Department called its lapse 'inexcusable.'"

Of course the U.S. Attorneys Office in Montana had no comment after losing their case.

(See our post below for more background).

More Prosecutorial Misconduct by U.S. Attorneys

The WR Grace trial is a beauty. The Rove Racket went after this company for environmental crimes in regards to an asbestos mine owned by WR Grace in Libby, Montana. The mine closed in 1990.

Although environmental pollution is a horrible thing, what is worse is the prosecutorial misconduct in this trial by Assistant U.S. Attorney Kris McLean (the man on the far right of the photo, copyright Associated Press).

McLean intentionally withheld email evidence from the defense. The email evidence was an exchange with the government's supposedly star witness. Sounds similar to the prosecutorial misconduct in the Ted Stevens case.

The AP writes this morning:

McLean opened with an apology for earlier failing to give defense lawyers copies of e-mails relevant in the defense of Robert Bettachi, one of the former executives. "That was my mistake," McLean said. "My mistake caused an interruption in this trial." U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy had told jurors not to consider the testimony of Robert Locke, a key prosecution witness involved in the e-mail communications, when considering the charges against Bettachi. The judge told jurors Wednesday to regard Locke's testimony cautiously when weighing the cases of other defendants. Molloy has broadly criticized the prosecution, at one point telling federal attorneys they did not understand the evidence they were presenting. Last week he dismissed charges against two former executives, shrinking the number still on trial to three, but he refused to end the trial on grounds of prosecutorial misconduct. Motions to acquit remain pending, and Molloy said Wednesday that he would not rule on them before the jury returns verdicts.

Can you believe the judge told the Rove Racket they didn't understand their OWN evidence?

With a botched trial and prosecutorial misconduct, Molloy should contact U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder's office as soon as the case concludes.

Read more about the WR grace case here and here.

Siegelman Case Rises Again

The wrongful conviction of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman is elevating again, slowly in the news. We expect the spotlight to rise in the forthcoming weeks especially on the heels of a Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals decision on the Paul Minor case.

The MetroWest Daily News of Framingham, Massachusetts has an opinion piece that posted yesterday. Here is an excerpt:

Attorney General Holder must immediately reverse the government's position and ask the court to vacate the convictions of (former Alabama) Gov. Siegelman, and failing all else, President Obama must pardon Gov.
Siegelman to stop a gross miscarriage of justice. Not only that, Congress must, as a first priority, finally enforce the subpoenas that Karl Rove has been thumbing his nose at for over a year, and he must be compelled to testify about his role in politically motivated persecution of Gov. Don Siegelman.

An End to Prosecutorial Misconduct?

Breaking News: "In his first confab with the nation's chief federal district judges, Attorney General Eric Holder Jr. pledged to raise the bar of professionalism in the U.S. Department of Justice and acknowledged that the current procedure for reviewing complaints against attorneys was too slow and opaque."

Details are emerging this morning about this closed-door meeting held on April 21st.

Holder has encouraged federal judges to contact his office directly to layout details of any occurrences of prosecutorial misconduct during the Rove-Bush Administration.

Law.com reports, "Holder invited the judges to contact him directly about problem prosecutors and other areas of concern. He even gave the crowd his phone number, a symbolic gesture that resonated with many judges who say the department's emphasis on national security, while justified, has put distance between the two branches in recent years."

Read the full law.com article here.