Rep. Cunningham's Plea Was Only the Start

[cal04]

The political scandal that brought down former U.S. Rep. Randy ``Duke'' Cunningham didn't end when the Vietnam War hero began serving an eight-year sentence in federal prison for taking millions of dollars in bribes. Since Cunningham, R-San Diego, was sentenced in March, the case has turned into a sprawling federal investigation with all the soap opera elements - money, power and sex. One of Washington, D.C.'s most notorious landmarks - the Watergate Hotel - even has a place in it. The case has many wondering where it will go next after a dizzying week in which the name of Rep. Jerry Lewis, chairman of the powerful House Appropriations Committee, surfaced in the probe and the home of the outgoing executive director of the CIA was searched.

The link in all these strands isn't Cunningham, who pleaded guilty to accepting $2.4 million in bribes from defense contractors. It's San Diego businessman Brent Wilkes, described in Cunningham's plea agreement as an unindicted co-conspirator. Prosecutors allege Wilkes paid Cunningham, a former member of the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee and the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, more than $626,000 in bribes between 2000 and 2004 to win government contracts for his companies.

But it's Wilkes' links to other lawmakers, lobbyists and government officials that has dramatically expanded the case.
``It's all about Wilkes paying people to get contracts,'' said Melanie Sloan, a former federal prosecutor in Washington and executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. ``Anybody who Brent Wilkes has been making substantial contributions to, they're going to be looking at. They'd have to.'' Wilkes' attorneys have said he has done nothing illegal. His lawyers, Nancy Luque and Michael Lipman, did not return a phone message left seeking comment.

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Randall Eliason, former head of the public corruption section of the U.S. Attorney's office in Washington, said it looks like investigators are casting a wide net. ``It looks like they're going to explore all of Wilkes' contacts and sort of follow where it leads,'' he said. ``Whether that means other members of Congress will be indicted, it's almost impossible to say from the outside.''

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-5819982,00.html

[Felinity]

1. Will the NSA data-mining pay off here?

All they have to do is follow the web that attaches to Wilkes' phone numbers! That should implicate the every Repub in Congress (and a few Democrats who haven't given up talking to these guys), their staffs, relatives, constituents, and let's face it, half the sex-trade workers in DC!

I love the NSA! We'll for sure get to the bottom of all this. With 6 degrees of separation, maybe we could turn part of the Capitol Building into a prison and hire prostitutes as guards; they won't even want to leave!

[MADem]

2. And Jerry, Not the Nutty Professor, Lewis is in this up to his eyeballs

Follow the damn money!

Top lobbyist receives $600,000 severance pay

By Lisa Friedman, From our Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON — Congressional watchdogs on Friday blasted a $600,000 severance payment that a lobbying shop with ties to Rep. Jerry Lewis made to one of its partners days before he assumed a top slot with Lewis on the House Appropriations Committee.

Redlands native Jeff Shockey lobbied Congress on behalf of dozens of San Bernardino and Riverside county agencies in his six years with Copeland Lowery Jacquez Denton & White. Shockey quickly rose to partner, and before leaving in 2005 to become Lewis' deputy staff director, he earned $1.5 million, making him one of Washington's top lobbyists.

Considering Shockey's salary and stake in the firm, several ethicists said they do not consider a $600,000 severance payment excessive. At the same time, a multi-million dollar going-away present from a firm with interests before the committee to an aide with his hands on Congress' purse strings troubled many watchdogs.

"I think it stinks," said Michael Surrusco, director of Common Cause's ethics campaign....

http://www.presstelegram.com/news/ci_3817028

[swag]

3. Recommended for greatest - this one is going deep and wide.

The AP story is being picked up in US papers today. It may be worth mentioning that Laura Rozen was going down this track months ago and is always worth reading on this mess. Her commentary from this morning, festooned with informative hyperlinks, is worth a look:

In some ways, Wilkes has a lot in common with Abramoff, the southern California GOP roots going back to the era that elevated Reagan and accompanied him to Washington. Abramoff did his time serving the apartheid cause in South Africa and building support for it in Congress, Wilkes did the same with the contras in Central America. Abramoff got tied in to DeLay. Wilkes got tied in with Bill Lowery, and several others from the southern California GOP delegation, including but not only Cunningham. The most controversial policies of that era and this one are connected to the excesses and the corruption we're seeing investigated and exposed now. What's the common theme, between the pay offs and prostitutes and bribery, and running the policies that can't withstand public exposure and Congressional scrutiny? . . .