There’s some news about an (alleged) participant in the Perdigao mess.
William Jefferson is the Louisiana congressman who gained some national notoriety when he commandeered a bunch of coast guardsmen to go check on the stuff at his house (thus taking the guardsmen off other tasks such as, say, rescuing stranded people), and then nine months later got more notoriety when a search of his home in a bribery investigation turned up $90,000 in cash in the freezer, along with a controversial (and, it turns out, illegal) search of his congressional offices. The word is that the F.B.I. has him on video taking a $100,000 bribe. In spite of all these hassles, he did get himself re-elected in 2006, and, in June of last year, got indicted.
Followers of Folo may have noted his role in the huge truth-or-fiction RICO complaint filed by James Perdigao; Jefferson was the person that Perdigao said was bribed by the star witness in the Edwards prosecution to influence the result in the witness’s own prosecution. There is a passage in the complaint describing the delivery of bribe money to Jefferson’s back steps. You can read about it here.
Well, today the U.S. Attorney’s office in New Orleans announced that they had indicted a bunch of Jefferson’s family: his sister (who is a 4th District Assessor in New Orleans), brother (who also is described getting cash in the Perdigao complaint, and niece.
A no-slouch lawyer friend in New Orleans told me today, with a thread of personal knowledge that, while there surely is some serious spinning in Perdigao’s complaint, there also is much more than meets any eye that has beheld all this from uninformed vantage.
Significantly, not many or almost no New Orleans lawyer of any substance/repute would have taken the plaintiff’s case……. but the one who did is top-drawer. (That incredibly rich, detailed complaint certainly raised the question of Rule 11 sanctions, now assuaged.)
The implicaton/inference is that as wild as the complaint is, there is smoke and somewhere some serious fire. Especially, perhaps, some stuff that would knock down the conviction of Ewin Edwards. Oh, my.
And William Jefferson just might hold a lot of pertinent information, including such that could put the government itself on a hot plate. Would he hold it back to spare his family the end game of today’s indictment? Was it done to wrap his knowledge in foil and put it in a forever freezer, like so many unspent dollars?
Inquiring minds want to move on to another topic.
Perdigao was not lying in the complaint and he has not included all that he knows. You know, people think it sounds like a John Grisham novel but Grisham’s novels were fiction based on observations made while practicing law. Grisham took trickery into the realm of the diabolical (murder). I have my fingers crossed that the trickery turned in on itself does not descend into the diabolical. Many people know that Perdigao is not lying. Many people know.
Sally,
Is James related to Gunther in any way?
Possibly siblings — I would have to ask.
I believe you have a typo in your post….they
found $90,000 in his freezer, not $9,000.
George and Weezie are next to be indicted.
You’re right, Plexix, both the CNN and WaPo articles say $90K.
I knew that there were complaints about it, but when was the FBI search found to be illegal? If it was, that sets a rather disturbing precedent, I think. A Congressman could hide any incriminating evidence in his offices there, one presumes. If it were paper evidence, he could probably have it destroyed there.
I corralled that truant zero, guys, thanks. Cujo, that ruling against the FBI came pretty quickly — when was it? last year?
While you’re correcting, it was national guardsmen Jefferson commandeered, not coast guardsmen. The NYTimes has the search in May, 06, initial rulings July, 06 (see pdf link on the following link to NYTimes article) the Appellate Court ruling in August, 07 and the Supreme Court declining to review the ruling in March of this year.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/31/washington/31cnd-scotus.html?hp