Posted on 09/08/2007 3:44:40 PM PDT by Libloather
Jefferson asks judge to toss 14 charges
And he wants trial moved to Washington
Saturday, September 08, 2007
By Bruce Alpert
WASHINGTON -- Accusing the Bush Justice Department of mounting a bogus bribery case and employing race-based tactics, attorneys for Rep. William Jefferson, D-New Orleans, asked a federal judge Friday to throw out 14 of the 16 charges against the nine-term congressman and to move his trial to Washington, D.C., from northern Virginia.
**SNIP**
Legal scholars said some of the motions have a chance to prevail.
In the most provocative challenge, lead attorney Robert Trout accused the government of choreographing events, including changing the location of a 2005 meeting in which Jefferson received $100,000 from an informant, to justify bringing the case in a jurisdiction friendlier to the prosecution. The brief said the government wants to try the case in northern Virginia because the judicial district has a lower percentage of African-Americans than Washington, and may therefore be more sympathetic to an African-American politician.
The Justice Department defended its decision to try the case in the northern Virginia suburb of Alexandria.
**SNIP**
Jefferson's motions, filed with U.S. District Court Judge T.S. Ellis III, argue that some documents photographed during the Aug. 3, 2005, search of the congressman's New Orleans home should be excluded as evidence because they were not specified in the warrant. Defense attorneys also argue that the Justice Department side-stepped statute of limitations deadlines and evidence problems by lumping some charges under vague conspiracy allegations.
The attorneys also say that what Jefferson is accused of doing, including accepting payments to help U.S. firms get contracts in Africa and meeting with U.S. government agencies to further the deals, doesn't meet the definition of the federal bribery statute.
**SNIP**
(Excerpt) Read more at nola.com ...
Rep. William Jefferson, D-La., left, talks with Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco, right, before the start of a speech by President Bush at the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Charter School for Science and Technology on Wednesday, August 29, 2007, in New Orleans. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
William Jefferson, 7, is greeted by his second grade teacher Lisa Reynolds on the first day of school at Silverlake Elementary School, in Pearland, Texas, Monday, Aug. 27, 2007. (AP Photo/The Chronicle, Nick de la Torre)
OJ Simpson has used up the last get out of jail free card.
Legal scholars said some of the motions have a chance to prevail.
Sure they do. /s
We can only hope. With today’s legal genius’s a/k/a Clintoon appointed Judges it’s a crap-shoot whether or not justice will prevail.
Yes now for a hard question.
No Liberal corruption here? Give me a break! If the GOP had any guts and gonads, all these examples of Liberal graft and corruption would be exploited to the hilt.
Sure, Jefferson! You want to move the trial out of Northern Virginia where people are educated and upper income white folks live. You would much rather choose a jury from a poorly educated and black Washington, D.C.
I believe a Reagan appointee......
ping
anytime a Republican misspeaks, taps their foot in a bathroom stall they are hounded and attacked by the media. Democrats can get caught in actual federal crimes and be ignored. Didn’t a Senate aid once violate federal felony gun laws?? whatever happened?
D.C. - Mike Espy’s house of jury nullification!
Well, well....There is light at the end of the William Jefferson D-LA tunnel! Thanks for the info.
“taps their foot in a bathroom stall...’
yeah, that’s what happened... come on...
Asking for more jurists of a certain race isn't racist - is it?
hey, its just a joke
Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA) plays the Race Card
Attorneys for Freezer King Rep. William Jefferson, Democrat of Louisiana, filed motions in federal court on Friday asking the judge to throw out 14 of 16 charges against the Congressman. They also requested a change of venue from Northern Virginia to the District of Columbia.
[They maintain that] the government choreographed events, including changing the locale of a 2005 meeting in which a government informant gave Jefferson a briefcase with $100,000, to justify bringing the case in a jurisdiction friendlier to the prosecution. The brief said that the government wants to try the case in northern Virginia because the judicial district has a lower percentage of African-Americans than Washington, D.C does, and therefore violates the Constitution's guarantee of equal protection. Jefferson is African-American.
It gets better, overleaf.
In a display of legal parsification that would make the other William Jefferson (Clinton) proud, the attorneys moved to throw out charges based on a curious interpretation of a 1999 Supreme Court case [emphasis added]:
Quoting from a 1999 Supreme Court decision, Jefferson's legal team said that to win a bribery conviction, the government must show that a public official accepted something of value in return for an official act. But, they argue, none of Jefferson's alleged actions, including funneling $367,000 from the Kentucky company iGate Inc., to a business owned by the Jefferson family in return for the congressman's help winning contracts in Western Africa, are "official acts" of a member of the House of Representatives.
The government's contention that some letters to African officials were written on congressional stationary, arrangements for some his trips to Africa were made by his congressional staff and some meetings with officials at the Export-Import Bank, for example, listed Jefferson as a member of Congress, doesn't take away the major deficiency of the government's case: Helping American businesses with transactions in Africa isn't part of a member's official duties, Jefferson's motion says.
Nowhere, the Jefferson brief says, does the government accuse the congressman of casting a vote, introducing a bill, proposing a hearing or getting an appropriation - the activities that full [sic] within a member's official duties.
While there are rules that limit the amount of outside income a Congressman may receive (which it sounds as though Dollar Bill violated), it would seem that the contention is that the Congressman's pursuit of filthy lucre is a hobby, or perhaps a lifestyle choice, and not an abuse of his Congressional office.
I still think the whole thing stinks! I’m not saying that he’s not a little in the loafers, but come on..... I still think he was set up by the dim’s. Tapping a foot and a wide stance, is grounds for arrest...when? If that’s the case, the police scare me even more than a 60 yo gay guy.
Move the trial to DC, pick a jury and blame Fuhrmman for planting the money. It’ll work there.
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