Alaska lawmaker accused of taking bribes

An Alaska lawmaker accused of getting thousands of dollars out of a corrections-company consultant in exchange for his help in the Legislature has been charged with extortion, conspiracy, bribery and money laundering

State Rep. Thomas T. Anderson, 39, pleaded not guilty to the charges at an arraignment Friday in federal court. He was released on a $10,000 bond and given permission to go on a family vacation in Mexico.

Anderson, a Republican from Anchorage, was arrested Thursday, a day after a federal grand jury handed up an indictment, U.S. Assistant Attorney General Alice S. Fisher said.

The seven-count indictment alleges that from July 2004 to March 2005, Anderson and the lobbyist received $26,000 from the consultant in exchange for Anderson's agreement to act on his behalf in the Legislature.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061209/ap_on_re_us/alaska_lawmaker_bribery_2

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

... a moderate Republican, was =JUST= elected as a state senator here (hasn't even taken the oath yet)

She just had her first baby this past summer..

..and I feel bad for the little guy, but not for either of her parents!!

He was released on a $10,000 bond and given permission to go on a family vacation in Mexico.

How many criminals get that kind of arrangement?

Still gets to go on vacation out of the COUNTRY? :shrug::crazy: :eyes: :wow:

With wealth comes privilege.

I grew up at Ft. Richardson ...10 years ...hardly ever see an Army brat in one place for so long ...thanks to Viet Nam though ...

from tonight's local news. It's going to get very interesting around here in the next few months, I believe, and could go all the way up to our "esteemed" federal officials. My fervent hope is that Don Young will get caught up in all this stuff some way (he's taken hundreds of thousands of dollars from VECO over the years). We heard rumors before the election that he was being investigated, but nothing is public yet.

Prosecutors say Anderson’s arrest may be first of many



by Bill McAllister
Friday, Dec. 8, 2006

Anchorage, Alaska - Rep. Tom Anderson's arrest may be a dramatic crisis for an individual public official, but it does not resolve issues with the influence-peddling investigation that led the FBI to raid six legislative offices and the oil field services company VECO Corp. in August and September. No one seems to think that Anderson's case is the end of this. But observers, including two former prosecutors, are trying to discern what the timing and manner of Anderson's indictment might mean for other cases still pending.

Former U.S. attorney Wev Shea has been disturbed enough by what he believes is rampant corruption in Alaska politics that he has twice written the FBI about it, and he says the indictment of Anderson is a small part of the ongoing investigation. Shea says the same about the oil field services company VECO, which was raided along with legislative offices this summer.

"I don't think the true target is VECO; I think the true target goes well beyond VECO. And I think there's a good chance it goes to major oil companies, that it goes to the executive branch of Alaska state government and may go to Washington, DC," Shea said. House Minority Leader Ethan Berkowitz, himself a former prosecutor, said he also thinks the shake-up will continue.

"Here's where the FBI's doing the state a disservice. If it has information and is ready to arrest, it ought to do it now, so we can start to heal the state and start to heal the Legislature. The FBI and the federal government, by heel-dragging, make it harder for the state to get past this point," said Berkowitz, D-Anchorage.

The man who was listed by the state as the director of Cornell Companies' lobbying operations in 2004 says he cannot talk about what happened but that much more is yet to come.

Frank Prewitt writes, "It's inappropriate for me to talk about the voluntary role that I and others may have played in the Anderson investigation. But I believe this is only the beginning of the end of a sad chapter in Alaska history that will unfold over the next year. My prayers are with Rep. Anderson and his family during this difficult time."

Anderson's wife, Rep. Lesil McGuire, sees a connection between the investigations. "My fear is that Tom has become low-hanging fruit and that there are investigations out there that may not be going the way want and that they're using this as a platform," McGuire said. Shea agreed that the level of corruption in Alaskan politics is tragic.

"It's a tragedy. And it's a real tragedy. And I think Anderson is going to sing like a bird to do anything he can to protect himself," he said.

Everyone agrees that this story has more chapters yet. Shea said that a lot of people had suggested before Anderson's arrest that Anderson himself was a FBI informant, although he never bought that idea because he says the FBI would have tried to disguise Anderson's involvement by raiding his office, too, which they didn't.

The indictments were a long time coming: according to the federal grand jury indictment, the crimes Anderson committed were two to three years ago. Shea said he thinks federal agents and attorneys wanted to carefully construct a case without alerting other suspects before they had to, which explains the lag between crimes and punishment.

It's hard to tell whether Anderson's arrest has anything to do with the FBI raids in August, which were largely focused on materials relating to the petroleum reserves tax and former Gov. Frank Murkowski's natural gas pipeline negotiations.

Cornell Companies and VECO Corp. collaborated on a failed effort to establish a private prison in Whittier in 2004. Anderson has done consulting work for VECO and was observed in May passing notes to other legislators from VECO Corp. CEO Bill Allen during House floor debate on the petroleum tax.