-Caveat Lector-
Begin forwarded message:
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: June 27, 2007 12:14:24 PM PDT
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: No. 2 Man in Bush's Dept of the Interior Goes to Prison
During Senate confirmation hearings, it emerged that Grilles
had had some "domestic altercations" which led to the following
charges: Breaking and Entering (Richmond, VA 9-Jul-1975), charge
reduced; and Trespassing (Richmond, VA 9-Jul-1975), convicted.
Divorcing that wife, Grilles shacked up with his boss in the
Bush Administration, while handing out goodies to lobbyists and
getting goodies for himself and his gal pal (now his wife).
Ain't life grand for second-tier Cabinet members in the banana
republic AKA "F*ck-America."
Judge Orders Prison Time for Ex-Interior Deputy
By James V. Grimaldi
Washington Post, June 27, 2007; A02
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/26/
AR2007062601472.html?hpid=moreheadlines
A federal judge rejected the tearful pleas of the former second-
ranking official in the Interior Department yesterday and sentenced
him to 10 months in prison for a felony conviction of obstructing a
Senate investigation into corrupt lobbyist Jack Abramoff.
"You are not above the law," U.S. District Judge Ellen S. Huvelle
told former deputy interior secretary J. Steven Griles as he asked
for forgiveness.
Griles pleaded guilty in March to lying to the Senate about his
relationship with Abramoff. In the plea agreement, prosecutors
recommended a sentence of five months of house arrest and five
months in prison.
But Huvelle imposed a sterner penalty of 10 months in prison and a
$30,000 fine. She said she wanted to send a message to deter
wrongdoing by high-ranking government officials. Defense attorneys
had asked for three months of home detention, community service and
a "reasonable fine."
Griles, 59, the highest-ranking federal official convicted in the
Abramoff scandal, apologized for his actions and cited 24 years of
public service. "This has been the most difficult time," Griles
said, pausing to break down in tears, "in my life. My guilty plea
has brought me great shame and embarrassment. I have lost my
business, my income and, most importantly, my reputation."
The judge said that years of public service were no cause for
leniency. "You held a position of trust as number two in the
Department of Interior, and I will hold you to a higher standard,"
Huvelle told Griles. "I find that, even now, you continue to
minimize and try to excuse your conduct and the nature of your
misstatements."
After the judge left the packed courtroom, Griles sought comfort
from his wife, Sue Ellen Wooldridge, a former Interior Department
solicitor and former assistant attorney general.
Griles, who is not cooperating with the federal investigation, was
introduced to the now-convicted lobbyist by a girlfriend who ran an
advocacy group co-founded by former interior secretary Gale Norton
and financed by Abramoff's Indian tribal clients.
The government contended that Abramoff thought that if he and his
tribal clients contributed money to the group, then he would gain
special access to Griles through the girlfriend, Italia Federici.
Federici pleaded guilty this month to tax and perjury charges and
agreed to cooperate with the government. She admitted to acting as
a go-between, shuttling information and lobbying requests from
Abramoff to Griles. The government alleged that Abramoff raised
thousands of dollars for Federici's group -- the Council of
Republicans for Environmental Advocacy (CREA) -- just before Griles
became deputy secretary.
The government said that Griles had asked for $100,000 for CREA and
Abramoff solicited the funds from his tribal clients. Griles said
that while he helped raise money earlier, he was unaware of those
2001 contributions to CREA on eve of his joining the Interior
Department. He said he learned of them later when Federici stopped
acting as a conduit between the lobbyist and Griles.
With her brow furrowed, Huvelle expressed disbelief several times
that Griles did not know that Abramoff was funding CREA at a time
he was romantically involved with Federici.
Griles stood in the front of the courtroom and said Abramoff was no
different from any lobbyist who came before him as the top deputy
to then-Secretary Norton. "I had more contact with many, many
lobbyists -- more than Jack Abramoff," Griles said.
Barry M. Hartman, attorney for Griles, told the court that the
actions Griles took involved "normal, appropriate contacts with
lobbyists," and that his only offense was not being truthful to the
Senate about his relationship with Federici. Griles's attorneys
disputed as "inaccurate inferences" government assertions that
Griles pushed Abramoff's lobbying requests as he urged the lobbyist
to hire his friends and bankroll a girlfriend's plan for a charity.
But Huvelle dismissed the defense attorneys' arguments. She also
questioned government lawyers at one point about whether they
accepted too lenient a plea from Griles. "The agreement you have
with the government is a very favorable one," Huvelle told Griles.
See what's free at AOL.com.
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