It Does Happen In America - The Political Trial of Don Siegelman

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Pat H

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The Bush II regime and it's political trial in Alabama, in all its ugliness. This is the Bush crime family at its most visible.

It Does Happen In America
The Political Trial of Don Siegelman

by Paul Craig Roberts


Don Siegelman, a popular Democratic governor of Alabama, a Republican state, was framed in a crooked trial, convicted on June 29, 2006, and sent to Federal prison by the corrupt and immoral Bush administration.

The frame-up of Siegelman and businessman Richard Scrushy is so crystal clear and blatant that 52 former state attorney generals from across America, both Republicans and Democrats, have urged the US Congress to investigate the Bush administration’s use of the US Department of Justice to rid themselves of a Democratic governor who "they could not beat fair and square," according to Grant Woods, former Republican Attorney General of Arizona and co-chair of the McCain for President leadership committee. Woods says that he has never seen a case with so "many red flags pointing to injustice."

The abuse of American justice by the Bush administration in order to ruin Siegelman is so crystal clear that even the corporate media organization CBS allowed "60 Minutes" to broadcast on February 24, 2008, a damning indictment of the railroading of Siegelman. The "60 Minutes" segment is so compelling that the Republican-owned CBS affiliate in Alabama, WHNT, blacked out the broadcast, offering a lame excuse of technical problems that CBS in New York denied. The Republican-owned news media in Alabama worked hand in glove with the political prosecution to ruin Siegelman.

The injustice done by the US Department of Justice (sic) to Siegelman is so crystal clear that a participant in Karl Rove’s plan to destroy Siegelman can’t live with her conscience. Jill Simpson, a Republican lawyer who did opposition research for Rove, testified to the House Judiciary Committee and went public on "60 Minutes." Simpson said she was told by Bill Canary, the chief GOP political operative in Alabama, that "my girls can take care of Siegelman." Canary’s "girls" are two US Attorneys in Alabama, both appointed by President Bush. One is Bill Canary’s wife, Leura Canary. The other is Alice Martin. According to Harper’s Scott Horton, Martin is known for her abusive and wrongful prosecutions.

What was the "crime" for which Siegelman and Scrushy were convicted? You will not believe this. Scrushy’s firm made a contribution to the Alabama Educational Trust, a charitable organization, to retire debt associated with the Alabama education lottery proposal. Scrushy was a member of Alabama’s Certificate of Need board, a nonpaid group that oversaw hospital expansion. Scrushy had been a member of the board through the terms of the prior three governors, and Siegelman asked him to serve another term.

Federal prosecutors claimed that Scrushy’s charitable contribution was a bribe to Siegelman in exchange for being appointed to the Certificate of Need board. In the words of federal prosecutor Stephen Feaga, the contribution was "given in exchange for a promise for an official act."

Feaga’s statement is absolute nonsense. It is well known that Scrushy had served on the board for years, felt he had done his duty, and wanted off the board. It was Siegelman who convinced Scrushy to remain on the board. Moreover, Scrushy gave no money to Siegelman. The money went to a charitable foundation.

As a large number of attorneys have pointed out, every US president appoints his ambassadors and cabinet members from people who have donated to his campaign. Under the reasoning applied in the Siegelman case, every president, cabinet member and ambassador should be in federal prison.

How in the world did a jury convict two men of a non-crime?

The answer is that the US Attorney used Governor Siegelman’s indicted young assistant, Nick Bailey, to create the impression among some of the jury that "something must have happened." Unbeknownst to Siegelman, Bailey was extorting money or accepting bribes from Alabama businessmen in exchange for state business. Bailey was caught. Presented with threats of a long sentence, Bailey agreed to testify falsely that Siegelman came out of a meeting with Scrushy and showed Bailey a $250,000 check he had accepted in exchange for appointing Scrushy to the Certificate of Need board. Prosecutors knew that Bailey’s testimony was false, not only because they had Bailey rewrite his testimony several times and rehearsed him until he had it down pat, but also because they had the check. The records show that the check, written to a charitable organization, was cut days after the meeting from which Siegelman allegedly emerged with check in hand.

In video documentaries available online, Bailey’s friend, Amy Methvin, says that Bailey told her that he was going to parrot the prosecutors’ line, "pay for play," "quid pro quo." Methvin says Bailey went into a speech about money exchanged for favors. "You sound like a robot," Methvin told him. "You would have it memorized, too, if you had heard the answers as many times as I have heard the answers," Bailey replied.

The prosecutors also had help from some jurors. On a WOTM Special Report hosted by former US Attorney Raymond Johnson, Alabama lawyer Julian McPhillips produced emails from two jurors about influencing other jurors in order to achieve a conviction. Jurors are not supposed to discuss a case outside the court or to consider information other than what is presented in court and allowed by the judge. The outside communication among the jurors is sufficient to declare a mistrial.

However, Federal District Judge, Mark Fuller, a Bush appointee, ignored the tainted jury. Fuller himself was part of the prosecution. He bore a strong grudge against Siegelman. Fuller had been an Alabama district attorney before Bush made him a federal judge. Fuller’s successor as district attorney was appointed by Siegelman and produced evidence that Fuller had defrauded or attempted to defraud the state retirement system.

Despite his known animosity toward Siegelman, Fuller refused to recuse himself from Siegelman’s trial. According to the WOTM Special Report, Fuller owns a company that was receiving federal money during Siegelman’s trial. Fuller did not disclose this conflict of interest. Everyone knew the trial was Karl Rove’s effort to rid the Republicans of the candidate they could not beat, and the Republican judge presiding over the trial had a company whose coffers were being filled with federal money.

The Justice (sic) Department’s answer to the exposure of its frame-up of Siegelman is that Siegelman was indicted by career prosecutors and convicted in a fair trial by a jury of his peers. These claims are no more truthful than anything else the DOJ says. Horton reports that career prosecutors advised against the case, concluded it was a political vendetta and walked away from it. Canary’s "girls" were "flailing about trying to find loyal troopers who would shut up and do what is expected of them," a category into which Scott Horton says Louis Franklin and his deputy Stephen Feaga fell. The jurors were presented with Bailey’s perjury suborned by the US Attorney's office and misled about what the testimony actually meant.

Horton says the case was "pressed forward with brute political force." According to Horton, Leura Canary refused to recuse herself despite her obvious conflict of interest. After she was forced to recuse herself, she continued to control the case from her office. In Horton’s words: "Her husband was managing the campaign against Siegelman and leaks from the investigation were emanating from someone at his address. But beyond this, her husband, Bill Canary, had a long, well established, close working relationship with Karl Rove covering work he did in Washington and Alabama over a period of more than 17 years. Leura and Billy Canary were close friends of, and socialized with, Karl Rove."

The Bush Justice Department first went after Siegelman during his 2002 reelection campaign. When Siegelman was first elected in 1998, the Republican Alabama Attorney General, William Pryor, began investigating Siegelman. There was nothing to investigate, but his "investigation" was the entry for Leura Canary, who federalized the "investigation." Politically motivated leaks from the "investigation" were used in an effort to defeat Siegelman’s reelection.
It almost worked, but Siegelman narrowly won.

Unable to defeat Siegelman even with leaks from a phony investigation designed to smear him, the Republicans decided to steal the election. After all districts had reported the vote count, Siegelman thanked the voters for reelecting him and went to bed. During the night the Republicans, with no Democratic voting officials present, "recounted" the ballots in Baldwin County. Six thousand Siegelman votes that had been reported disappeared in the recount. The next morning Republican Bob Riley declared himself the winner.

The theft was so hastily arranged that the thieves forgot to change any of the other vote outcomes on the ballots. All other races had the same totals as originally reported, a statistical impossibility had there actually been a computer glitch as the election thieves claimed.

The Republican attorney general Pryor refused a recount. The Republican Justice (sic) Department and Republican federal judges looked the other way, as did the Republican propaganda sheets that masquerade as news media in Alabama.

President Bush rewarded William Pryor for his service by making him a federal judge in a recess appointment as he could not be confirmed by the US Senate. According to MSNBC and other reports, investigations had produced more serious charges against Pryor than against Siegelman, but Pryor, being a chief Republican operative, was immune from prosecution.

The case against Siegelman was drawn out in the media for two more years in the hopes of smearing him forever. When Leura Canary’s false case was finally brought to court, Federal District Judge U.W. Clemon threw it out of court. Clemon cited an assistant US Attorney and an assistant state attorney general for contempt of court. All charges against Siegelman and his co-defendants were dropped on October 5, 2004.

Vindicated, Siegelman began his campaign for recovering the governorship in 2006. The word came from Washington to get Siegelman at all costs. Siegelman was indicted a second time on October 26, 2005, costing him the Democratic primary. The jury twice deadlocked and was twice sent back by Siegelman’s adversary, Judge Fuller. With charges of jury-tampering in the air, Siegelman was acquitted of 25 counts and found guilty of "pay for play." Judge Fuller had Siegelman handcuffed and manacled and immediately whisked off to prison for a seven-year sentence. Normally a non-dangerous person is left at liberty while the case is being appealed.

The Siegelman case makes it clear exactly what Bush, Rove, and the disgraced Bush flunky Alberto Gonzales intended by firing the eight Republican US Attorneys. These eight refused to politicize their office by falsely prosecuting Democrats in order to achieve a Rovian political agenda. Apparently, there were only eight honest persons among the 1,200 Republican US Attorneys. Bush, Rove, and Gonzales had no problem with the other 1,192.

Former Alabama Supreme Court Justice Terry Butts said that Justice in America today is about political agendas, "not about convicting real criminals." Butts said that Siegelman’s attorneys and allies expect reprisals from the US Attorney’s office and Alabama’s Republican establishment.

Karl Rove refused to testify about the case before Congress.

On February 25, 2008, Fox "News" gave Karl Rove airtime in which to deny the accusations and evidence against him, which he did.

The Department of Justice (sic) refuses to release Siegelman trial documents to Congress.

Siegelman’s family home was broken into.

Siegelman’s attorney’s office was broken into and ransacked.

Jill Simpson’s house was burned down, and her car was run off the road.

This is the way "justice" works in Bush Republican Amerika.

Author’s note: Scott Horton, Harper’s Online, has reported extensively and courageously on the frame-up of Don Siegelman. Raw Story has a multi-part report by Larisa Alexandrovna and Muriel Kane. The "60 Minutes" broadcast is available from YouTube as is the WOTM Special Report. YouTube also has a multi-part documentary on Richard Scrushy. Brad Blog provides good coverage including a MSNBC broadcast on the Siegelman prosecution which traces it back to Karl Rove. Ernest Partridge’s Online Journal account provides additional information including the conclusion of a study by Professors Donald Shields and John Cragan that the Bush Justice (sic) Department has investigated seven times more Democratic than Republican officials. More information is available online for interested readers.
February 28, 2008
Attribution
 
Another Lew Rockwell conspiracy thread. Nice. :barf:

Does Lew know how the someone is indicted in Federal Court? And convicted? And the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure to have a verdict set aside? Or about how an appeal works?

Let me guess: the entire Federal criminal system is a vast, skull and bones mason zionist conspiracy. :rolleyes:
 
Paul Craig Roberts is a syndicated columnist, the story was picked up by LRC. The facts are as listed.

Conspiracies with well documented facts are real, not theories.

Your post, Mr. Fremmer, is a near text book example of both ad hominem and ad vercundiam.

So, if you'd like to post evidence that counters that found in Dr. Roberts article, please do so.
 
Nah, it's a silly conspiracy story, no more and no less.

I don't have to prove anything. Lew is the one who is spewing this conspiracy stuff, so let him prove it. I don't have to disprove Lew's silly conspiracy stuff. The purported conspiracy is so vast that it even extends to a purported media black-out. :rolleyes:

Oh, the humanity! The guy was convicted of a crime. By a jury. That is not President Bush's fault. That's the fault of a criminal who violated Federal law. He lost an election because he's a criminal. Good.

Bummer to violate Federal law and get caught, huh? The silly conspiracy theory (multiple conspiracies!!!:eek:) are no excuse for criminal behavior. Sorry, President Bush didn't make the guy violate the law. The guy did it all by himself, got caught, and he has to suffer the consequences.
 
"convicted on June 29, 2006"

This is not news. The case has been in the papers for years.

I wasn't at the trial and haven't read the transcript in its entirety, so I only know what I've read. I also assume these fat cats have better lawyers with better advice than what they'd get from me.

John
 
"This is the way "justice" works in Bush Republican Amerika."

And here we have a prime example of why anybody with any sense doesn't take this whack job style of what can loosely be called reporting seriously. Too much built-in bias.

John
 
Dr. Roberts article is in the editorial style, it's not reportage in the journalistic style, and wasn't portrayed as such.

It is a demand for justice, one with which I agree.

It does, also, shine a greater degree of light on the domestic crimes of the Bush family and their close associates.
 
Dr. Roberts article is in the editorial style.....

Titles of previous "editorials" by Mr. Roberts:

- Leaderless and Clueless America Heads for the Trash Can of History

- Criminals With Badges—How the Police Create Crimes

- Has Bush Been Spying, Blackmailing Congressional Democrats?

- Bush’s Dirty Secret: Bribing Iraq Insurgents Not to Fight

- How Did Western Civilization Get A Monopoly On "Moral Conscience" When It Has No Morality?

- Impeach Bush And Cheney Now

Anybody see a pattern?
 
60 minutes just did a story on this

(CBS) Is Don Siegelman in prison because he’s a criminal or because he belonged to the wrong political party in Alabama? Siegelman is the former governor of Alabama, and he was the most successful Democrat in that Republican state. But while he was governor, the U.S. Justice Department launched multiple investigations that went on year after year until, finally, a jury convicted Siegelman of bribery.

Now, many Democrats and Republicans have become suspicious of the Justice Department’s motivations. As correspondent Scott Pelley reports, 52 former state attorneys-general have asked Congress to investigate whether the prosecution of Siegelman was pursued not because of a crime but because of politics.


http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/02/21/60minutes/main3859830.shtml

There is also an congressional investigation going on, but that is all just consiparcy theory :rolleyes:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Siegelman#Congressional_reaction
 
Another Lew Rockwell conspiracy thread.


Correct me if I am wrong, but werent you they guy who once claimed that the was no such thing as neoconservatives and that the very word was just conspiracy theory?
 
Oh sure, the congressional democrats are investigating. So what? They are also investigating global warming, dog farts, and apple peels, too. Maybe they ought to investigate how to actually accomplish something, but that would take real work.

A congressional investigation cannot overturn a jury's verdict. Let me repeat: the defendant was convicted by a jury of his peers. A federal judge sentenced the defendant pursuant to that conviction. The defendant was not elected because he is a criminal. The defendant can appeal.

And none of it has anything to do with President Bush. Sorry to disappoint you and Lew Rockwell and the author of this silly conspiracy theory editorial. Perhaps 60 minutes can bring Dan Rather back to create some fake documents and really stir things up. :rolleyes:
 
Oh sure, the congressional democrats are investigating. So what?
.

So they can put pressue on the justice department to hurry up the appeal and investigate as to if there was any wrong doing on the part of the partisan hack DOJ put up by the Bush admin, who were forced to sack Gonzalez because of the complete hackery he brought to the department.

And none of it has anything to do with President Bush.
.

Really? I guess Bush didnt appoint Gonzales to the DOJ, I guess Karl Rove has no connection to Bush :rolleyes:.
 
I would laugh so hard if that fat carcass Karl Rove got into trouble over this. It truely would make my day.
 
"Dr. Roberts article is in the editorial style"

I've been reading newspapers, 2 or 3 different ones, everyday for 40+ years and his so-called style is not any type of "editorial style" that I've ever seen.

Whack job, nut case, etc. That's his style.

John
 
I'm never interested in "Conspiracy Theories", but I do think conspiracy facts ought to be have the light of day shone brightly on them.

This, for example, "The frame-up of Siegelman and businessman Richard Scrushy is so crystal clear and blatant that 52 former state attorney generals from across America, both Republicans and Democrats, have urged the US Congress to investigate the Bush administration’s use of the US Department of Justice to rid themselves of a Democratic governor who "they could not beat fair and square," according to Grant Woods, former Republican Attorney General of Arizona and co-chair of the McCain for President leadership committee. Woods says that he has never seen a case with so "many red flags pointing to injustice."".
 
So, if you'd like to post evidence that counters that found in Dr. Roberts article, please do so.

The jury verdict. O wait, jury verdicts are OK as long as EVERYONE agrees with them.

Let us know when it runs through the appeal process. Until then, just another whining crook.

Free Mumia. Free Hurricane. Free the Border Patrol guys. Blah blah blah.

WildnextAlaska ™
 
A polite suggestion:

If someone wishes me to take their posts seriously, they should avoid the use of the following terms:

The Bush Crime Family
Dhimmicrats
Rethuglicans
Comrade Klinton
Obamarama
Chimpy McHitlerburton
Moose Limbs
Shrillary
John McRINO
...and many, many more.


I ask this favor for the following reasons:

1) I don't receive the latest crypto decoder sheets in the mail from your particular political faction. I might get so bored trying to decode your message in order to figure out who the heck you're talking about that I give up and go read something else.

2) Rhyming name-calling is SO 3rd Grade Playground.
 
The story just doesn't wash:

1. Siegelman was convicted by a Federal Jury,

2. The person who supposedly alleged that Karl Rove was behind the prosecution of Siegelman disputes that she ever made that charge, she admits that her affidavit doesn't make the charge:

An affidavit cited as proof that White House strategist Karl Rove helped arrange the Justice Department prosecution of former Gov. Don Siegelman doesn’t actually say Rove was behind the investigation, the lawyer who wrote it said. But that hasn’t stopped others from using the affidavit to demand a congressional hearing.

Jill Simpson, the Republican Rainsville lawyer who wrote the affidavit, said in an interview that she is not responsible for how others interpret her sworn statement. She said she tried to accurately represent a conference call she heard in which Rove’s name came up, and she said no one definitively said in that call that Rove arranged for Siegelman’s investigation.

It’s not clear if Rove was being identified in the call as the person behind the investigation or as someone who heard Siegelman already was under investigation, Simpson said.

“You can read it both ways,” Simpson said in the interview Friday. “I did it as best I could to factually write it down as exactly as to what was said. And there’s two interpretations to it, there’s no doubt about that

3. Simpson has changed her story several times, and has raised new allegations in the 60 minutes interview that she was never willing to testified to when under oath and facing the perjury statutes when testifying before congress.

Just more shrill anti-Bush hysteria.

What are the lefties going to do for a new boogieman when Bush is gone? Who will they use to keep the troops motivated and sending in the cash then?
 
If someone wishes me to take their posts seriously, they should avoid the use of the following terms:

The Bush Crime Family
Dhimmicrats
Rethuglicans
Comrade Klinton
Obamarama
Chimpy McHitlerburton
Moose Limbs
Shrillary
John McRINO
...and many, many more.

I like: "Dick Cheney and his henchmen" That'd be a great name for a Jazz band.
 
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