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DOJ on Siegelman: Nothing to See Here
The Justice Department doesn't think much of Dana Jill Simpson's affidavit implicating Karl Rove in the decision to prosecute former Gov. Don Siegelman (D-AL), according to a letter Paul discussed yesterday. In the letter, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brian Benczkowski took a number of swipes at Simpson's credibility.
Simpson, an Alabama native and Republican lawyer, signed a sworn statement this spring saying she was part of a Gov. Bob Riley (R-AL) campaign conference call in 2002 discussing how to get Siegelman to concede the close election. Simpson said that one caller, Bill Canary, offered that his "girls would take care of him" -- referring to his wife Leura Canary, a US attorney in Alabama, and her friend, another US attorney in the state. Canary also assured the group that he and Rove had previously discussed Siegelman and that Rove made sure the DoJ was pursuing the former governor.
Benczkowski attempted to dismiss Simpson's claim, saying:
In the affidavit, Ms. Simpson claims to have overheard statements she attributes to U.S. Attorney Leura Canary's husband. The national media interpreted the alleged statements as linking the prosecution of former Governor Siegelman to Karl Rove.At the time Ms. Simpson alleges the purported statements were made, Mr. Siegelman was already under federal investigation. The existence of the investigation had been widely reported in newspapers and television reports, some released more than ten months before the alleged conversation. The alleged conversation described by Ms. Simpson has been denied by all of the alleged participants except Ms. Simpson.
A couple of things to note about this. It says Simpson claims she "overheard" statements, though she actually says she was an active member on a campaign strategy call. And more importantly, Simpson said in her affidavit that the investigation of Siegelman was already underway. DOJ's insistence that the Siegelman probe began before the call does not contradict her set of facts. The question about the seed of that probe remains.
Simpson is set to give closed-door testimony before the House Judiciary Committee Friday.
Comments (10)
Mike Conwell wrote on September 11, 2007 12:06 PM:I don't understand how this story isn't getting more traction, and Siegelman waits in jail while Rep Don Young and Rep John Doolittle and a host of others continue their corrupt terms of office.
moondancer wrote on September 11, 2007 12:44 PM:Actually, I think this story is getting traction finally. The question is will congress be able to overcome the administrations obstruction of justice.
anon wrote on September 11, 2007 12:59 PM:I think the links to Rove and fredo are clear.
One Seigelman thread that I haven't seen anyone pulling on is Eddie Curran, the Mobile Register reporter who seems to be part of the Rove team in AL. Curran's a laundry for GOP operatives (like, say, Quinn Hillyer, the American Spectator editor who used to run the Register's op-ed page) and he leaked all kinds of stuff from various grand juries and investigations aimed at taking down Seigelman. He's got a foul mouth, a ton of inside information, and dodgy ethics. (Check out the "special reports" on Curran's behavior in his own newspaper. Talk about blogger ethics...)
So, remind me again, how, exactly is Curran's career connected to the GOP? And, goodness, adding a new wing to your house after you take Seigelman down, remind again who paid those bills?
Oh, and take a look at Curran's insane comments on Legal Schnauzer. Whew.
JEP wrote on September 11, 2007 2:24 PM:Siegelman was under investigation, inherently, the moment he took the office of Governor in the first place.
Am I exaggerating when I suggest that, considering the history of the transition that Alabama politics has gone through since the end of the 2oth Century, there's no bigger bullseye than the Alabama Governor's office?
When it comes to partisan politics, this is an example of the WH (via Rove) and the ALABAMA-DOJ being deeply involved in the worst intrigue.
This reinforces the emerging image of Republicans as bullies who can't take the heat.
Anonymous wrote on September 11, 2007 2:27 PM:anon is Curran
Anonymous wrote on September 11, 2007 3:13 PM:We the citizens of Alabama this sixth anniversary of the 911 terrorist attacks on our country are tired of corruption that lies deep in the heart of our state. We are preparing the second of four requests for congressional hearings/investigations. We believe that the three largest newspapers in AL. owned by Advance Publication Inc. have close affiliations with high ranking state and federal politicians who are using the name of the Republican party to conduct illegal activities for personal gains. We believe that these newspapers are attacking Democrats that hold or who are running for high state and federal offices by purposely writing articles to sound negative and eliminating important facts that would help the individual politicians.
We believe that these damaging attacks by these three newspapers of Democrats will prove to be associated with the congressional hearings/ investigations that are ongoing with the firing of the 8 U.S. Attorneys who would not prosecute along party lines.
We feel that managers of these newspapers maybe working with Karl Rove and/or his affiliates. I feel that an investigations needs to be conducted to see if Alabama is the only state that is being targeted by them or does the corruption go all the way back to Advance Publication Inc. I feel that either the FBI or the Republican U.S. Attorneys office has purposely leaked confidential information that have damaged politicians who belong to the Democratic party (this leak was very obvious during June 2007) especially in the Mobile, Al. newspaper.
Reverend Bob Richardson wrote on September 11, 2007 3:20 PM:We the citizens of Alabama this sixth anniversary of the 911 terrorist attacks on our country are tired of corruption that lies deep in the heart of our state. We are preparing the second of four requests for congressional hearings/investigations. We believe that the three largest newspapers in AL. owned by Advance Publication Inc. have close affiliations with high ranking state and federal politicians who are using the name of the Republican party to conduct illegal activities for personal gains. We believe that these newspapers are attacking Democrats that hold or who are running for high state and federal offices by purposely writing articles to sound negative and eliminating important facts that would help the individual politicians.
We believe that these damaging attacks by these three newspapers of Democrats will prove to be associated with the congressional hearings/ investigations that are ongoing with the firing of the 8 U.S. Attorneys who would not prosecute along party lines.
We feel that managers of these newspapers maybe working with Karl Rove and/or his affiliates William Canary and Jack Abramoff. I feel that an investigations needs to be conducted to see if Alabama is the only state that is being targeted by them or does the corruption go all the way back to Advance Publication Inc. I feel that either the FBI or the Republican U.S. Attorneys office has purposely leaked doctored accounts and confidential information that have damaged politicians who belong to the Democratic party (this leak was very obvious during June 2007) especially in the Mobile, Al. newspaper.
Mark Fuller wrote on September 11, 2007 3:42 PM:Everyone has got to read this for a laugh about Leura Canary and her so called informant Super reported Eddie Curran.
Leura Canary wrote that the defendants’ accusations, prosecutors are quick to point out that their case against Siegelman, Scrushy and their acquitted co-defendants, did not begin with a call from Karl Rove, but rather from a long series of exposés in the Mobile Press-Register.
In early 2001, Press-Register investigative reporter Eddie Curran began writing what would later total more than 100 articles exposing pervasive public corruption throughout the Siegelman administration.
An aggressive reporter with a low-tolerance for political equivocation, Curran demonstrated a talent vetting public records and shedding light on political scandals even before Siegelman took office. In a column in 2002, his editor, Mike Marshal, described Curran this way:
“Since long before there ever was a Siegelman administration, Eddie Curran has practiced a routine. He says good-bye to his wife and kids, climbs into his car and points it toward Montgomery. There, he visits different state office buildings, exchanges greetings and quick family updates with the clerks and administrators at work there, and then gets to work himself. He digs into state records - folders full of records, cartons full of records, metal cabinets full of records, mountains of musty, tedious, stultifying state records.
“And when he is bone weary and can't stand the sight of another carbon copy, he climbs back into his car and drives home, often with nothing to show for the trip but bloodshot eyes and ink-stained fingers.”
But sometimes Curran did find something, and two-years into Siegelman’s administration he exposed a series of scandals so numerous that there is space enough here to detail only a few.
anon wrote on September 11, 2007 4:36 PM:Whoa. No, anon is not Curran.
However, it looks like the comments on Legal Schnauzer really are Curran.
And Curran, IMO, is a key player. Yes, he has reported on Republicans. Yes, he's hotwired into the GOP playas in AL. Yes, many of his stories are true. But he plays the game like the current DoJ plays it.
Anyway, I'm surprised he hasn't been mentioned at all. Take a look at his articles and then compare them to a few outside sources or--and this is what tipped me off--just compare them to the legal paperwork. (Which used to be all over the Mobile Register site and the DoJ sites but are mostly missing now and require a little creative archive.org work.)
Just because Curran's an SOB doesn't mean he's not corrupt.
Anonymous wrote on September 12, 2007 9:34 AM:Well, of course Siegleman's administration wasn't lily-white. No administration in the real world ever is. And there's a strong possibility that he danced perilously close to the line a few times. Was Curran right to expose these incidents to us AL voters and let us decide, as we always do, whether the shadiness was worth the benefits he brought to AL? Of course- that's his job as a reporter.
But this is a separate question from whether or not Siegleman's behavior was actually criminal, and all the evidence I've heard of and seen points to no. This is PARTICULARLY true of the underlying facts of the crime for which he was actually found guilty: reappointing a health care exec to a position that he had held under several governors on the board of an agency dealing with health care planning. The prosecution became so outlandish that I frankly hope it was politically motivated, as the alternative is massive incompentcy on the part of the DOJ.
One other point worth making here: though I'm an ardent liberal democrat, I really and truly have only respect for Gov. Riley, who has in large part distanced himself from a lot of the goings-on at the national GOP. There is no suggestion that Riley was involved in this nastiness more then peripherally.