Jan
27
Special prosecutor to investigate selective prosecutions?
Filed Under Department of Justice, Paul Minor, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
In a letter dated December 12, 2008 Hiram C. Eastland, attorney for Paul Minor, asked House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate whether the selective prosecution of Paul Minor by Bush Justice Department attorneys was politically motivated. Although the committee directed the Justice Departments Office of Professional Responsibility and its Inspector General’s Office to investigate whether Minor was selectively prosecuted more than eight months ago, “no specific response regarding Paul Minor has been forthcoming.”
The letter closes “. . . justice and fairness demands that a truly independent investigation be undertaken by a special prosecutor with the necessary tools to ensure that the thoughtful objectives of your Committee are accomplished. The public’s confidence that America’s criminal justice system does not in any way tolerate taking political prisoners, Democrat or Republican, and the public’s confidence in the Justice Department’s prosecutive decisions will only be restored when all parties having a role in Paul Minor and other political defendants’ political prosecutions across the country are fully investigated, held accountable and brought to justice.”
You can read the full letter here.
Aug
28
Rove Raised Campaign Money for Judge in Minor Case
Filed Under Bush Administration, Department of Justice, John Whitfield, Karl Rove, Paul Minor, Wes Teel | Leave a Comment
The Raw Story
Lindsay Beyerstein and Larisa Alexandrovna
The federal judge who denied a prominent Democratic fundraiser’s motion for release pending appeal last week is a former client and protégé of former White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove.
On Aug. 15, US Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Priscilla Owen (above right) upheld a lower court’s decision to keep Mississippi attorney Paul Minor in jail pending his appeal, adding more controversy to a case already steeped by allegations of both a politically motivated prosecution and conflicts of interest on the part of the US Attorney.
Minor, a once-prominent trial lawyer, was formerly Mississippi’s largest Democratic donor and made millions from a 1998 settlement with tobacco companies of a lawsuit for costs incurred by Medicare from smoking-related illnesses. The suit kindled resentment among Republicans who had been beneficiaries of the tobacco companies’ largesse.
Owen’s two-sentence order reads: “Minor has failed to establish by clear and convincing evidence that he is not likely to pose a danger to the community if released.”
Minor was convicted of mail fraud and bribery in 2007. The prosecution has contended that Minor is dangerous because he violated the terms of his pre-trial bond two years ago. The defense countered that Minor’s rule-breaking was trivial, non-violent in nature, and unlikely to recur because Minor has now been successfully treated for his drinking problem.
As reported in Raw Story’s ongoing award-nominated series, The Permanent Republican Majority, many saw the two Minor trials – which included as co-defendants Justices Wes Teel and John Whitfield, who were also found guilty, and Justice Oliver Diaz, who was not – as connected with the politicization of the US Department of Justice and the alleged use of US Attorneys by former White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove to target political opponents and perceived enemies of the Bush administration. (See links to part 4, 5, 6, and 7 of the series following this article.)
Both Minor and Diaz allege that they were victims of political prosecution orchestrated by Rove.
It is the alleged involvement of Karl Rove in the prosecutions of Paul Minor – as well as the better-known case of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman – that has raised eyebrows among Minor supporters about Owen’s recent ruling.
Aug
18
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Aug
12
Tobacco, Gambling and “Justice” in the Age of Rove
Filed Under Bush Administration, Department of Justice, Don Siegelman, Karl Rove, Paul Minor, Roger Shuler | Leave a Comment
Legal Schnauzer
Why have prominent Democrats in the Deep South been the victims of apparent political prosecutions under the Bush Justice Department?
The prosecutions of Paul Minor in Mississippi and Don Siegelman in Alabama can be traced to legal and political battles over tobacco and gambling, according to a compelling new article by Larisa Alexandrovna and Muriel Kane at Jackson Free Press.
Why are trial attorney Paul Minor and former Mississippi state judges Wes Teel and John Whitfield currently in federal prison? Alexandrovna and Kane point to Minor’s courtroom victories over tobacco companies in the 1990s. Teel and Whitfield appear to have been “collateral damage” in an effort to shut down Minor’s financial support of Democratic causes.
Minor represented plaintiffs in a case that wound up with the four largest American tobacco companies paying $246 billion to states in the largest civil settlement in history.
The tobacco companies–R.J. Reynolds, Brown & Williamson, Lorillard, and Philip Morris–were not happy to see Minor make millions from the deal and then become a generous contributor to Democratic candidates and campaigns.
Republican supporters of the tobacco companies were even less pleased. GOP bitterness over the tobacco settlement led to a tort-reform movement, designed to give corporations the upper hand in legal battles with consumers. At the center of this movement was Karl Rove, who had served as a consultant for tobacco giant Philip Morris.
Rove helped Republicans take control of state courts in Texas, Mississippi, and Alabama. And when George W. Bush became president in 2000, it appears that Rove launched a plan to investigate and prosecute prominent progressives in the Deep South. Two of those progressives were Paul Minor in Mississippi and Don Siegelman in Alabama.
Alexandrovna and Kane show how the two states at the Heart of Dixie were entertwined in the GOP strategy. Siegelman’s plan for an education lottery in Alabama was considered a threat to gambling interests in Mississippi. So disgraced Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff led a campaign to raise money to defeat Siegelman’s plan and protect the gaming interests of Mississippi Choctaws, an Abramoff client.
Meanwhile, a plan was afoot in Mississippi for Republicans to take over the governorship for only the second time since Reconstruction. Paul Minor, a major Democratic donor and a leading opponent of tort reform, was under federal investigation, and word of that probe leaked at the height of the governor’s race.
That helped ensure that Haley Barbour would defeat Democrat Ronnie Musgrove in the governor’s race.
And what about Barbour’s background? He’s a former lobbyist for Philip Morris and Big Tobacco.
Since taking office in 2004, Barbour has called a special legislative session to ban class-action lawsuits and cap damages in most tort cases. He also won a lengthy court battle to withdraw funding from a program that had been successful in reducing smoking among middle- and high-school students.
Aug
12
Paul Minor Asks to be Freed on Appeal Bond
Filed Under Bush Administration, Department of Justice, Don Siegelman, Paul Minor | Leave a Comment
Jerry Mitchell
jmitchell@clarionledger.com
Imprisoned trial lawyer Paul Minor is asking to be freed on an appeal bond, just as former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman was by an appeals court.
“Paul Minor’s case is every bit as compelling as Gov. Siegelman’s,” said a lawyer for Minor, Hiram Eastland Jr. of Greenwood.
Under the law, a federal judge can release a defendant on an appeal bond if the case raises “substantial questions of law or fact likely to result in reversal.”
In 2006, a federal jury in Alabama convicted Siegelman on corruption charges that accused him of trading contributions for political favors. Prosecutors said HealthSouth founder Richard Scrushy arranged $500,000 in donations toward the campaign for a state lottery, led by Siegelman, who in turn appointed Scrushy to a hospital regulatory board, where he had served in past administrations.
The trial judge denied Siegelman’s request for bond, but the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals concluded Siegelman deserved to be free while his appeal is being heard.
Because of questions raised by the House Judiciary Committee, the Justice Department is now investigating the Siegelman case, the Minor case and others. “The media, Congress and even the Department of Justice have raised issues of impropriety in this case,” wrote Minor’s lawyers.
In 2007, a federal jury in Mississippi convicted Minor on corruption charges for helping guarantee or pay off campaign loans of judges who heard some of Minor’s cases. That verdict came two years after a jury deadlocked on some counts in the same case while acquitting state Supreme Court Justice Oliver Diaz Jr. of all charges.
U.S. District Judge Henry Wingate of Jackson sentenced Minor to 11 years in prison and would not release him on appeal.
Since the judge revoked Minor’s bond Sept. 18, 2006, the lawyer has spent nearly two years behind bars.
Wingate said Minor posed a danger to the community because of his alcoholism.
Since court-ordered rehabilitation, Minor has been sober more than 27 months, defense lawyers say. Minor received the Bronze Star for heroism in the Vietnam War, but his inability to forget the horrors of war led him down to drink more, lawyers wrote.
A number of problems accelerated his alcoholism, including losing his home to Hurricane Katrina, the death of his father-in-law, his mother battling Alzheimer’s disease and his wife’s battle with brain cancer, lawyers wrote. “(Minor’s wife) is permanently disabled by cancer, requires full-time care and wants her husband to care for her.”
If Wingate grants Minor’s request for a hearing, Minor wants it heard by another judge.
Minor also is asking for Wingate to step down from hearing a related civil case in which USF&G Insurance Co. is suing Peoples Bank, Minor and former Chancery Judge Wes Teel.
On Dec. 18, 2001, Teel ruled in favor of Minor’s client, Peoples Bank, on the issue of liability in a case against USF&G. Two months later, USF&G settled for $1.5 million in favor of the bank.
Minor acknowledged guaranteeing loans for Teel but said he was only helping friends.
In February, USF&G complained in court papers that Teel and Minor had fraudulently obtained the $1.5 million.
USF&G lawyers say because Minor secretly guaranteed a loan to Teel at the same time Teel heard the case, USF&G was “defrauded and prejudiced.”
According to the motion filed this weekend by Minor’s lawyers, Wingate was contacted about an opening on the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on the eve of Minor’s second trial.
“While neither the basis for the legal allegations nor the law had changed from the first trial, Mr. Minor’s second trial in 2007 was conducted by Judge Wingate in a manner that was markedly different from the 2005 trial proceedings,” defense lawyers wrote.
The motion quotes from Harper’s magazine, which wrote, “Judge Wingate’s handling of the two trials was as different as night and day. In the second trial, he adopted a far more hostile posture toward the defense.”
Diaz wrote the House Judiciary Committee that Wingate issued opposite rulings on many questions. In the 2005 trial, Wingate told jurors a specific quid pro quo was required to prove bribery. In the second trial, Wingate didn’t require a quid pro quo.
Defense lawyers also point to Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew Friedrich’s recent comment: “Bribery requires proof of a specific agreement of a quid pro quo of this for that.”
Siegelman’s lead counsel, Vincent Kilborn of Mobile, said if courts don’t require a quid pro quo in political bribery cases, “politicians are going to be running scared about accepting contributions and at a later point appointing anybody to a certain office or voting a certain way. It’s going to put a damper on democracy.”
Aug
7
Justice For Sale
Filed Under Bush Administration, Don Siegelman, Paul Minor | Leave a Comment
The Jackson Free Press
By Larisa Alexandrovna and Muriel Kane
August 6, 2008
Almost immediately after his appointment to U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Mississippi in late 2001, Dunnica Lampton began to investigate key Mississippi Democrats.
Trial lawyer and major Democratic campaign contributor Paul Minor quickly became a target of such an investigation. On July 25, 2003, three months before the Mississippi gubernatorial election, a jury indicted Mississippi Supreme Court Justice Oliver Diaz Jr., Paul Minor, former Chancery Court Judge Wes Teel and former Circuit Court Judge John Whitfield on charges of bribery. The charges related to loan guarantees that Minor had made to the three judges to help defray campaign costs.
No state law prohibited Minor’s contributions, and his trial resulted in an acquittal on some charges and a deadlocked jury on others. However, immediately following that trial, Lampton brought new charges.
During the second trial, presiding Judge Henry Wingate excluded evidence that showed Minor had a long-established pattern of offering loans or loan guarantees to many friends in the legal community, thus creating the appearance that Minor had helped the three judges in hopes of receiving something in return.
Although prosecutors were unable to prove that Minor had bribed the judges in exchange for favors, the second trial resulted in a conviction. Minor was sentenced to serve an 11-year prison term and pay more than $4 million in fines and restitution.
As in the case of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman—also targeted by a Bush-appointed U.S. attorney—Minor has been denied appeal bond. Both Siegelman and Minor, despite being convicted of white-collar, non-violent crimes, were shackled and manacled, and moved to out-of-state prisons.
The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals has since released Siegelman as he appeals his case.
Mississippi Supreme Court Justice Oliver Diaz, who himself was indicted and acquitted twice in the Minor case, has asserted that the defendants were presumed guilty from the start. “An individual was singled out for examination from the federal government, and prosecutors then attempted to make his conduct fit into some criminal statute,” Diaz said. “This is not how our system of justice is supposed to operate.”
Continue reading here.
Aug
7
Scott Horton to be Interviewed about Minor Case on “Ring of Fire”
Filed Under Paul Minor | Leave a Comment
Sam Sedar will interview Scott Horton about the Minor Case on Air America’s “Ring of Fire” program this weekend.
From: S Seder [mailto:samuelseder@gmail.com]
Sent: Wednesday, August 06, 2008 6:51 AM
To: chiphill@capitolactiongroup.com
Subject: Re: Siegelman / Paul Minor
Chip, just an FYI, I am interviewing Scott Horton about his piece on Paul Minor’s case for this weekend’s ring of fire. I will have links to audio and video around this time next week.
thanks
Sam
Aug
7
Attorney for Paul Minor Responds to Government’s Brief Opposing Minor’s Release on Bond Pending Appeal
By refusing to support Paul’s request to spend time with his seriously ill wife in what might be her last months, the prosecutors have become unthinking and unfeeling. This inhumane response might have been expected from those who the evidence shows improperly selected Paul for prosecution, who upped the charges when Paul fought back, and who convinced the trial court to impose such a long and illegal sentence. We hope that the Fifth Circuit will make this right.
Aug
5
Source: The Jackson Free Press
More Judicial Horseplay?
By Adam Lynch
Imprisoned attorney Paul Minor is arguing in Fifth Circuit Court of Appeal filings that presiding U.S. Southern District Court Judge Henry Wingate showed bias against the defense in his 2007 trial by changing his jury instructions from his earlier 2005 trial, and by ordering that evidence be removed from the 2005 trial that had stalled the jury’s guilty verdict in that case. U.S. Attorney Dunn Lampton retried Minor on federal corruption charges after he failed to convince a jury in 2005 that Minor had bribed a judge. In the second trial, Wingate ruled out the necessity of proving quid pro quo—that any money or services were actually exchanged with a judge, which would typically form the basis of proving bribery. The removal made it easier to get a conviction.
Wingate also increased Minor’s sentence after his conviction to 11 years, beyond federal guidelines. Minor’s appeal arrived in the wake of an April congressional report on the alleged politicizing of the U.S. Department of Justice under President George Bush and former White House adviser Karl Rove. Rove has ignored congressional subpoenas to testify under oath on his alleged tampering in federal investigations against Democrats.
The report, “Allegations of Selective Prosecution in Our Federal Criminal Justice System,” names incidences of possible political targeting against Democrats and Democrat fundraisers in Michigan, Georgia, Alabama, and—in Minor’s case—Mississippi. The U.S. Department of Justice refused Minor’s recent motion for release pending appeal on Monday. Minor argued that his wife is dying of cancer, with only months left to live, and that he would have already served the sentence Wingate would have imposed had be not extended it beyond federal guidelines.
Minor’s attorney Abbe David Lowell expressed regret at the Fifth Circuit Court’s decision, but said he was confident Minor would overturn the jury’s verdict because of the holes in the case. “I know we will overturn this verdict,” Lowell said, adding that Congress is right to scrutinize Minor’s trial and many others because of the DOJ’s unethical machinations in the cases.
Aug
4
Government Opposes Paul Minor’s Appeal to Visit Dying Wife
Filed Under Bush Administration, Department of Justice, Paul Minor | Leave a Comment
The Department of Justice and prosecutors in Mississippi have filed a motion opposing the appeal of Mississippi trial lawyer Paul Minor to visit his dying wife. Minor, who became famous for taking on big tobacco in the 1990s, is now imprisoned on what many consider to be questionable charges.
The primary grounds for denial offered by Justice Department attorneys is that letting Minor visit his wife would present “a danger to the community.” They cite an “incident” when he was found drunk and escorted out of a hotel by security while free on pre-trial bond, after which he was ordered to attend treatment for alcoholism, as well as an occasion when he met with a hurricane expert at a restaurant near his home while he was supposed to be under house arrest.
“The district court previously found that Minor presented a danger to the community based on his alcohol abuse,” they wrote. “There is evidence that supports the district court’s finding that after a lengthy inpatient treatment, Minor defied and tested the court’s condition of pretrial release, which had been tailored to protect the public and prevent him from abusing alcohol.”
“Minor’s unauthorized Sept. 5, 2006 meeting with a hurricane expert at a restaurant serving alcohol not only raised issues concerning his substance abuse problems, it also showed his deception of the court.”
Minor says he met with the hurricane expert to assess damage to his home for insurance purposes after seeking approval from his probation officer and receiving no reply. Court records show that he was out of range of his electronic monitoring device for slightly over four hours.
Minor successfully completed treatment for alcoholism. He says that his drinking was aggravated by the trial and his wife’s cancer.
In their brief, the Justice Department did not contend that Minor was drinking when he met with the hurricane expert, only that the restaurant served alcohol. They argue that his 11-year sentence for bribery gives more credence to their assertion that he is a danger to the community because he could relapse.
Read the full story here.
