Okay, let’s masticate this:
OXFORD – Assistant District Attorney Lon Stallings and former Attorney General Mike Moore say a Daily Journal story Wednesday was substantially correct, but it missed on a couple of points.
Tuesday, Circuit Judge Henry Lackey testified in the lawsuit Jones v. Scruggs that he had not wanted to tell Attorney General Jim Hood’s office about a possible bribery suggestion from then-New Albany attorney Timothy Balducci because he believed Hood was close to Moore and Oxford attorney Richard “Dickie” Scruggs. Lackey suspected the bribery suggestion might have come from Scruggs through Balducci.
On the stand, Lackey said he had heard that because Hood didn’t want to settle a claims dispute with State Farm Insurance, Moore and Scruggs got mad, with Scruggs’ [sic] threatening to find a campaign opponent for Hood in the 2007 statewide election, just like he had done to Insurance Commissioner George Dale. Lackey said he heard that from Stallings.
However, Stallings told the Daily Journal on Wednesday he had told Lackey about Hood’s disagreement with Moore and Scruggs, but that he had never mentioned anything about Dale.
The threat to Hood did not include Balducci or co-defendant Steve Patterson, which an earlier story stated.
Stallings also said he told an investigator for Moore, who represents Zach Scruggs, about his advice to Lackey and what he had said about Moore and Scruggs’ disagreement with Hood.
A text message shown Tuesday to the Daily Journal, which reporter Patsy Brumfield originally thought was from Stallings, was not. It was from Moore associate Lee Martin, and Moore said again Wednesday it confirmed his recollection of what his investigator told him about speaking with Stallings and his advice to Lackey. …
So how did Patsy achieve her “original thought,” hm?
Patsy Brumfeld starts by saying her story was substantially correct except:
1. There was no text message from Lon Stallings, it was from a Moore associate.
2. Lon Stallings says he did warn Judge Lackey off contacting Jim Hood, because of Hood’s “disagreement with Moore and Scruggs.”
Um, what does that leave of the story? That Moore denied all vociferously?
This is a horrible attempt to cover up!
Geez – poor Patsy’s got to come up with some kind of explanation for her “misunderstanding” — because that was a pretty darned big misunderstanding. Huge difference b/w Stallings and a Moore associates. Wow. Somehow I can’t help but feel that Moore helped Patsy along in arriving at her misunderstanding.
Still looks like Judge Lackey’s testimony under oath does two additional things beyond the case at hand which have been noted previously on folo:
- Places Hood in line for a perjury charge; and
- Places Moore in line for charges of obstruction of justice or extortion or both.
If Moore and Hood keep talking, no telling what other graves they will dig for themselves.
Mike denied that Stallings told Lackey that he and Dickie were having a disagreement with Hood and that if Hood didn’t agree to the settlement Scruggs would back someone else, like he did with George Dale.
Just leave off the “like he did with George Dale” part and you got the story on what Stallings told Lackey and Moore’s investigator. And the lie Mike Moore told about it backed by Jim Hood on WLBT this morning.
It all happened in the courtroom during a recess, and there seemed urgency to their conversation. I figured watching it that Moore was making some sort of statement.
There was a vague quality to her description of the text message that made me wonder how carefully she looked at it. It was not quoted, for instance.
JOM 4, that’ll be nice: Moore and Hood blab until we complete the circle, ending up (almost) back where we started — with “bodies UNburied.”
NMC, did you watch their whole conversation straight through? How long would you estimate they talked? Did you see Moore hand over to Patsy his Blackberry (or whatever it was)?
I didn’t stare at them. I just caught that Moore was giving her an interview and obviously making a statement. I think I saw he had his blackberry in his hand.
JOM:4,
I totally agree. When do the next round of perjury investigations get started? Who starts them? Hood cant, I dont guess SF can, since Hoods perjury came in the Renfroe action and it was across state lines can the fed start a perjury investigation? Not a lawyer here of course but I have got to think there has been another railroading of the system by an “officer of the court” that has hurt justice. Hood and his predecessor Moore should be held accountable for their lies.
Need2Know:
Hood hasn’t testified in Renfroe– he testified in State Farm v Hood. He was so evasive on most points that there’s nothing to call perjury– evasiveness is not the same thing as lying.
Moore is making himself part of this story in a way that is a big big mistake on his part.
NMC: Yah, kinda along the lines of “it depends on what the meaning of is IS….”
What Hood did on the stand, under oath, in State Farm v. Hood was not “testimony”.
Q. My real question is: Did Mr. Patterson or Mr. Balducci have dinner with you and tell you that if you did not participate or assist Mr. Scruggs in settling that mass tort action which was going to generate a 20-million-dollar-plus fee, that he would fund an alternative candidate to run against you for attorney general?
A. If you’re asking me did somebody come to me and threaten me, the answer is no. Now, out of all candor in this, I don’t want to mislead you. I remember having dinner on one occasion with Mr. Balducci and Mr. Patterson, but that conversation was about they were leaving the firm that they were presently — that Mr. Balducci was presently with. They didn’t convey any threats to me about settling the case or anything like that.
Q. They never suggested that if you didn’t participate in dropping your criminal investigation that Dickie Scruggs would fund an alternate candidate and Mike Moore would support that?
A. No, sir. Absolutely not.
From today’s article on the situation from Patsy Brumfield at the Daily Journal . . .
The judge said he couldn’t take the problem to the state attorney general’s office because he had heard that Dickie Scruggs used Moore, former state Auditor Steven Patterson and former New Albany attorney Timothy Balducci to threaten Attorney General Jim Hood to settle State Farm Katrina-related insurance cases to allow the Scruggs Katrina Group to collect its legal fees.
Otherwise, he said, Scruggs would find a candidate to run against Hood for re-election [OMIT the rest of sentence as editorial in nature having been so clarified."]
Lackey said he heard that from assistant District Attorney Lon Stallings.
Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da
Given that Moore and Hood had this master-apprentice-like relationship, wouldn’t it be more likely that Moore pulled Hood aside and gave him that understanding directly instead of running it through some third party?
Mike denied that Stallings told Lackey that he and Dickie were having a disagreement with Hood and that if Hood didn’t agree to the settlement Scruggs would back someone else, like he did with George Dale.
He not only denied it, he said Stallings told his investigator something to the “contrary” and put words in his mouth to the effect of “Stallings said Lackey told him he didn’t trust Hood -Scruggs-Moore” as if it was Lackey’s sole idea to go where he went and made up the Stallings stuff.
Lotus #16
Do you mean like Darth Sidious’ master/apprentice relationship with Anakin Skywalker?
Some messages resonate with the listener better when delivered by multiple sources. Gives the message a whiff of inevitability.
My speculation about how Patsy Brumfield achieved “her original thought:”
If memory is correct, Patsy worked in the communications area for past Miss. Secretary of State Dick Molpus when Ray Mabus was governor and Mike Moore was AG–the three M’s that the New York Times Magazine touted as the state’s new progressive leaders to watch. I’m told that during that time Patsy and Mike Moore developed a “good friends” relationship and have remained friends.
My speculation is that during the court recess Tuesday Mike Moore sought out Patsy to make his denial, knowing that she would accept his statement and go with it in print without questioning or verifying.
Question time?? Who is Lee Martin?? Does he work for Mike Moore or The State of Mississippi?? Email goes to Mike Moores’ office and Physical address to AG’S office.
Magnolia
I think he works for Moore and worked for him when he was AT
(placing the cached html link to a pdf)
http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:kWijJlfaqlUJ:s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents/WSJus-v-scruggs-moore-appearance0803.pdf+%22lee+martin%22%22mike+moore%22&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us
Seacrest//Thanks, Rossmiller states his physical address is listed at the AG’s office. So Mike Moore pays him and not the State of Mississippi.
I bet Patsey feels like she got ambushed by someone she thought she could trust!
NMC Looks like someone else at Djournal did correction article not Patsy.
This may be a bit off topic but I found a link to a neat little debate between Scruggs and a dude representing the tort reform lobby.
http://www.legalreforminthenews.com/ROL/Hantler-Scruggs_Debate.html
I hadn’t seen a link posted to it before, so I thought I’d share. Apologies if it’s already been thoroughly digested by all.
There’s a lot of things he says that seems pretty funny now given his recent unpleasantness. I like his insistence that there is no collusion between trial lawyers, and there’s no such thing as a “magic jurisdiction”. But my favorite part might be when he talks about criminal defense lawyers saying outrageous things to the media.