Campaign Cash Questions (John Edwards and how trial lawyers make donations through the office help)

Newsweek/MSNBC ^ | 8/2/04 | Michael Isikoff and Holly Bailey

[Mamzelle]

Aug. 2 issue - John Edwards, seeking to avert a potential new flap over campaign fund-raising, is returning $44,035 in contributions raised by a prominent Los Angeles trial lawyer whose activities have come under legal scrutiny. The Kerry-Edwards campaign decided to return the money after being questioned late last week by NEWSWEEK about the role lawyer Pierce O'Donnell had played in raising cash for Edwards's aborted presidential race. O'Donnell, a longtime Edwards backer, cohosted a fund-raiser at an L.A. restaurant last year that drew $340,000. Earlier this year he (with film star Dennis Hopper) cohosted another Edwards event.

[Mamzelle]

Breck Girl has to give back the bogus boolah--now that he's caught

[Mamzelle]

I searched--but didn't find this posted. I encourage all FReepers to use newsmeat.com and fundrace.org to start searching for your local trial lawyers and their secretaries and their donation habits. You might just bust the bums...

[Piquaboy]

He can go out, chase another ambulance, and recover that much in a heartbeat. He is such a pretty blood sucking lawyer, isn't he?

[AFPhys]

" I encourage all FReepers to use
newsmeat.com and fundrace.org to start searching for your local trial lawyers
and their secretaries and their donation habits. You might just bust the
bums..."

Bump for research during slow periods...

[Mamzelle]

I'm looking at a couple of 'em this week. The problem is finding out the names of the secretaries...that's why a local research works rather than a distant one.

[Congressman Billybob]

I made this same suggestion in a thread a week ago. To flesh out the suggestion, anyone can search for (possibly) illegal Edwards donations by entering their own zipcode. That'll come up with information on people you may know personally -- do they have the spare money and the normal incentive to make the gift officially reported in their names?

For a broader search with even more information, do the seach this way: If your zipcode is 12345, enter 123** for the search. Pay special attention to the occupations (if any) of the generous donors of $1,000 and up. LOL.

Congressman Billybob

Latest column, "Down the Memory Hole: Joseph Wilson Disappears"

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[Mamzelle]

I noted your suggestion--and that's why I pinged. It's a great idea--an opportunity to combine grassroots Internet work with local observation. If Edwards has already had to give money back--there could be a pile more to find.

[Bob]

I found this part particularly interesting:

Among the $2,000 contributors in March 2003 was Elizabeth Owen, a paralegal at O'Donnell's law firm who, records show, filed for bankruptcy four months later. Another was Else Latinovic, an office administrator at the firm who filed for bankruptcy in 2000.

[Mamzelle]

Curious, wasn't it? Looks like Isikoff and Bailey did some careful combing of court records.