Legal News

On Boca Burgers and Pie Crusts: The Jefferson Trial Kicks Off

By Ashby Jones

LB colleague Dionne Searcey is following the action going on down in Alexandria, Va., where the trial of former representative William Jefferson kicked off on Tuesday with opening statements. First to step to the plate, assistant U.S. attorney Mark Lytle. Click here for past LB posts on the Jefferson trial. Searcey filed the following dispatch:

Louisiana Congressman William Jefferson violated the trust of U.S. citizens by using his office to carry out bribery schemes intended to financially benefit his family members, prosecutors told a packed courtroom at the start of his corruption trial Tuesday.

"One of our government's most powerful officials, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, was using his public office for private gain," Lytle told jurors in his opening statement here at the federal courthouse in Alexandria this morning.

With that, Lytle launched explanations of a dizzying array of alleged bribery schemes involving African-American businessmen who would arrive at Jefferson’s office looking for the Congressman's help in pursuing business opportunities in West Africa. In exchange, said Lytle, the businessmen would end up being forced to pay bribes to sham companies set up to benefit Jefferson's family.

But the real star of today's show was the cold cash: the $90,000 wrapped in aluminum foil and shoved in a freezer that the FBI found in a raid of Jefferson's home. Lytle displayed photos from the raid on large flat-screen TVs stationed around the courtroom. White-gloved hands held stacks of foil-wrapped cash tucked inside the cardboard containers of Pillsbury Pie Crust and Boca Burgers.

Lytle said prosecutors will play video tapes of Jefferson receiving that cash in a Ritz-Carlton parking lot and talking about how it was headed for the vice president of Nigeria, who was visiting Washington at the time. Jefferson allegedly bungled the cash drop, however, and the vice president left town without it. One of the charges against Jefferson, violation of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, doesn’t require a payment to actually be made for a defendant to be found guilty. It’s merely the offer that counts.

Defense attorney Robert Trout of Trout Cacheris was expected to counter after a lunch break that none of Jefferson’s alleged actions relate to his official duties, such as voting or introducing legislation. Trout is expected to say they were private acts and therefore not crimes.

Jefferson is facing 16 criminal counts of racketeering, bribery, money laundering and obstruction of justice for demanding and, in some cases, receiving bribes in return for his help promoting a telecommunications firm and other projects in West Africa. Jefferson is accused of plotting to give at least $100,000 in cash to the Atiku Abubakar, the vice president of Nigeria, in exchange for permission to offer telecom services over state-owned infrastructure.

The Democratic former Congressman who represented a swath of New Orleans hard hit by Hurricane Katrina was indicted in June 2007, and in a re-election bid the following year was ousted by Republican Joseph Cao.

The case is part of the Justice Department's crack down on corruption and represents the only time an elected U.S. official has been charged with violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which prohibits offering or intending to offer bribes to foreign government officials.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on June 16, 2009 (boomark / email).