Posted on 01/11/2006 2:49:42 PM PST by NormsRevenge
ALEXANDRIA, Va. - A former aide to Rep. William Jefferson (news, bio, voting record), D-La., pleaded guilty Wednesday to charges he helped the congressman solicit bribes to arrange two telecommunications deals. A spokeswoman for Jefferson declined to comment.
Brett Pfeffer, 37, pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting bribery of a public official and conspiracy. He could get 20 years in prison when sentenced March 31.
Specifically, Pfeffer said in federal court that a congressman demanded bribes in exchange for his assistance in brokering two African telecom deals.
Court documents did not identify the congressman by name, referring to him only as "Representative A." But the documents make clear that Jefferson is the congressman.
According to the documents, Pfeffer was employed as a legislative assistant by the congressman from 1995 through 1997. That is when Pfeffer served as a legislative aide to Jefferson, holding titles that included legislative director.
Pfeffer agreed to cooperate with prosecutors and testify if needed.
The conspiracy took place in 2004 and 2005, years after Pfeffer had left Jefferson's office, according to authorities.
Pfeffer said in court that a congressman had solicited his assistance in promoting business opportunities in Nigeria and Ghana. The congressmen demanded 5 percent to 7 percent of the newly formed African companies in exchange for his help promoting the deal to African government officials and others, according to Pfeffer.
Prosecutor Mark Lytle said the congressman and Pfeffer traveled to Ghana in July to promote a similar deal there.
Pfeffer's attorney, Paul Knight, declined to comment.
Prosecutors have been investigating Jefferson in connection with a telecommunications deal he was trying to arrange in Nigeria. The FBI raided Jefferson's home in August and, according to published reports, carted off cash from a freezer.
The FBI also raided the Maryland home of Nigerian Vice President Atiku Abubakar, seeking documents connecting him and his wife to the congressman and the telecommunications deal.
Jefferson was elected to the House in 1990, becoming the first black congressman from Louisiana since Reconstruction. He represents most of New Orleans, including sections of the city that were hardest hit by Hurricane Katrina.
He was criticized after the hurricane for receiving a National Guard escort to check on his flooded home at a time when federal resources were sorely strained.
Jefferson's spokeswoman, Melanie Roussell, declined to comment on the plea bargain.
Now if a Louisiana politician or staffer was ACQUITTED of bribery charges, THAT would be news.
Do you think Jefferson had a hand in the Nigerian spam messages that stated I am the son of so and so and have 30 million dollars that can only be tapped by foreign investors like you?
Earlier thread posted and deleted by lunarbicep, but hopefully will reappear.
Wanted to make sure repplies made were not lost
NR
--
Ex-congressional aide pleads guilty (Plea deal alleges Rep. Jefferson demanded bribe)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1556280/posts
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story.asp?guid=%7BD4EDF70C-B902-4B57-81A6-6599B49B4433%7D&siteid=google ^
Posted on 01/11/2006 2:47:49 PM PST by lunarbicep
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - A former aide to Rep. William Jefferson, D-La., pleaded guilty Wednesday to charges he conspired to bribe his former boss to help his company win a deal to provide Internet services in Nigeria.
Former congressional aide Brett M. Pfeffer agreed to the plea bargain in U.S. District Court in Eastern Virginia on Wednesday. He agreed to cooperate in the investigation.
Pfeffer faces up to 20 years in prison and a $500,000 fine.
The Justice Department's information does not name Jefferson by name, but his association with Pfeffer and with the Nigerian telecom deal has been widely reported. According to press reports, the FBI raided Jefferson's homes and the Maryland home of Nigerian Vice President Atiku Abubakar in August.
Jefferson represents most of New Orleans. He was a chief sponsor of an African trade bill and broke with other members of the Congressional Black Caucus in 1997 when he called for an end to economic sanctions against the regime in Nigeria.
The charges against Pfeffer allege that his former congressional boss, "Representative A," demanded a bribe in 2004 in exchange for his help in getting the telecommunications contract in Nigeria. The congressman met with Nigerian officials and with officials of the U.S. Export Import Bank to promote the deal, court documents say.
In 2005, the congressman spoke with Ex-Im Bank officials and officials from Ghana to help win a similar deal there, the Justice Department said.
According to court documents, the congressman demanded that the investment company hire a relative and that family members receive 5% to 7% of its newly formed Nigerian company.
"Pfeffer understood that Representative A was soliciting a bribe in exchange for Representative A's official assistance in furthering the Nigerian Deal," according to the statement of facts signed by Pfeffer. "It was the cost of doing business with Representative A."
After working for Jefferson between 1995 and 1998, Pfeffer became president of a Virginia investment company controlled by an unnamed person who has also cooperated with law enforcement authorities, the Justice Department said.
After a meeting in the congressman's office and at his urging, the investment company invested in the Kentucky telecommunications company, the charges say.
Later, the investment company entered into a licensing and distribution agreement with the telecom company, the charges say.
Press reports have named iGate Corp. as the Kentucky telecommunications company that licensed its technology to Pfeffer's company.
This case is not related to the ongoing investigation surrounding indicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who has pleaded guilty to corruption charges.
I think Congressman Jefferson may decide not to run for reelection after this. His New Orleans and Jefferson Parish district was ravaged by Katrina and God knows how many of his 2004 constituents (around 65% of whom were black and 75% of whom voted for Kerry) will be voting in 2006. We should really keep our eye on this race, since it could be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for a black Republican to win in what is a black-majority district according to the 2000 Census. (The closest we have come recently was Clinton LeSueur getting 44% or so in the MS-02 in 2002.)
The Sun News On-line | national news
http://www.sunnewsonline.com/webpages/news/national/2005/aug/29/national-29-08-2005-001.htm
"Unable to compete against U.S.-based DSL powerhouses, such as Verizon, iGate decided to test the waters in Nigeria considered one of the fastest-growing telecommunications market in the world."
Just how big is the scam/spam market?
I wonder if this will get the same media play as Randy Cunningham's corruption. Of course this scumwad Dem. congressman will just deny it and the media will accept it and that will be the end of it. Republican politicians just don't have the same mile-wide shameless streak their Democratic counterparts have.
If a Republican wins the seat, it will likely be a Caucasian one. Unfortunately, as it stands, there is not a single solitary Republican interested in considering making a race, but there are tons of Democrats. Peggy Wilson could be one for us, but she seems more determined to run for Mayor instead. Nagin himself is mentioned as a potential candidate to replace Jefferson. If I had to bet at the moment, I would suspect a White Democrat tending towards the moderate-left of center would take the seat.
Yeah, maybe the reason those Nigerian spam-scam messages are so pervasive is the they are put out by some of these "Nigerian telecom" companies that Jefferson was involved with.... I imagine sweatshops full of scam artists pecking at keyboards, deluging the world with their imbecilic spam-scam....... "Hello, I am the upstanding son of the late Minister of Mines who left a secret windfall of $30 million, for you and me to share....."
Since it's Louisiana, there will almost certainly be a run-off. If enough Democrats run it may allow the Republican to finish in the top-two and thus make the lower-turnout run-off. Even with so many New Orleans residents moving away, I still assume that blacks would be a majority of the electorate (after all, the Jefferson Parish districts in the CD are also heavily black and it's not like whites from the New Orleans area didn't move away as well). The only way that the GOP would have any chance at all of pulling off the upset would be with a black candidate; if a black Republican makes the run-off against a white liberal Democrat, our odds of winning would increase substantially, and even against a black Democrat we might have a chance. The problem is that I don't know any prominent black Republicans in the New Orleans area.
Reading the rest of this thread about Republican chances in LA makes me sick!
I suspect the majority of the whites in Jefferson's district vote Dem. There is no "there" there.
Unless I'm mistaken, there appears to be only one Republican elected to the legislature from fully within Orleans Parish (excluding those representing mere slivers), and that's longtime Rep. and former Speaker Pro Tempore Emile "Peppi" Bruneau. Torie is apparently correct in stating that virtually all the other Whites from OP are Democrats. Unfortunately, upon looking up Bruneau's residence, it appears it is narrowly within Bobby Jindal's district. Of course, Bruneau was widely respected enough to achieve a leadership position even in a Dem-dominated body (he switched parties awhile back). If there was any way to persuade Bruneau to take a run for the job, I'd do it (he's going to be term-limited out before long, anyhow, so he has nothing to lose).
http://house.legis.state.la.us/h-reps/members.asp?ID=94#
as an addendum, the most GOP precincts in OP in the far west are not in Jefferson's district.
I checked out Barone's Almanac last night, and the district was 64% black in 2000. Assuming a higher rate of persons under 18 and a smaller percentage of registered voters among blacks, I would guesstimate that in 2004 60% of the voters were black and 40% were non-black (mostly white Anglos). Kerry won 75%-25%, and presumably carried 90% of the black vote, which would extrapolate to Kerry carrying the non-black vote by only 52.5%-47.5%. Since the non-black vote includes Hispanics, Asians, etc., which probably voted for Kerry, I would guess that the district's white Anglo vote was split around 50-50.
But my main point is that perhaps over half of the district's voters will not be voting in the district in November 2006, having moved to other parts of Louisiana or other states. These displaced voters are disproportionately from NO, which of course is the part of the district with larger percentages of blacks and Democrats. While I can't fathom that the remaining voters would have given President Bush more than 40% in 2004, the fcat that such few voters will be deciding the election, that Jefferson County voters will be much more likely to participate than NO voters, and that there might be 5 or more Democrats running attack ads on each other makes me think that it would be unwise to write off the district and not run anyone.
I think a black Republican could beat a white Democrat in that district in 2006, and that a black Republican may even be able to beat a black Democrat in 2006 if his losing Democrat opponents are pissed off enough and have enough hopes of recapturing the seat in 2008.
(Obviously, when I said a Republican could, in theory, win, I meant in the December run-off.)
I still have to believe, sadly, that the place is so polarized politically (beyond racially) that it would be irrelevent if a Black Republican got into the runoff. It rather reminds me of Gary, Indiana a decade ago when the Democrats nominated a White man (remarkable in that there are literally almost no White people left in Gary) and the Republicans thought they hit the jackpot when they nominated a Black man. Take a guess who won.
The LA GOP had a Black Republican from Baton Rouge named Kirt Bennett running for Lieutenant-Governor and he barely registered a blip on the radar screen in the last statewide election. I always wondered when Bobby Jindal ran for Governor and increased his numbers in N.O., was the increased support from Black voters, or was it from more liberal-minded Whites who preferred the more educated and intelligent Jindal to the country-bumpkin Blanco ?
Jindal was endorsed by Mayor Nagin, and it is thought that he did pretty well for a Republican among New Orleans blacks.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.