Former U.S. Attorney Joe Hogsett and Marion Co. Prosecutor Terry Curry may fail to see criminal wrongdoing in former Education Supt. Tony Bennett and key employees of his office engaging in political activities on state time and using state resources for political purposes, but the U.S. Attorney in the Northern District of Indiana has no impediment to bringing criminal charges for similar conduct. Today, charges were filed against Calumet Township Trustee Mary Elgin and three key employees in her office for fraud and extortion for using taxpayer resources for political gain according to the Northwest Indiana Times.
According to the Times, the case laid out by federal prosecutors says Elgin expected her employees to either purchase or sell campaign fundraising tickets, enlist subordinates to sell fundraising tickets during government office hours and placing employees who couldn't afford the ticket prices on payment plans. Employees who failed to cooperate were threatened with unfavorable treatment by their supervisors, including unfavorable work assignments or layoffs. The indictments came with just two weeks left in Elgin's term as township trustee. Elgin is charged with wire fraud, extortion, tax offenses and making false statements to federal agents. Three other employees, Ethel Shelton, Steven Hunter, who is Elgin's son, and Wheeler, also face wire fraud and extortion charges.
The system devised by Elgin required employees to either sell a certain number of tickets or buy them based upon their pay scale. Employees tried to skirt laws prohibiting campaign activities during normal office hours by claiming they were on break while performing such duties according to the indictment. Inter-office memos were circulated admonishing employees of the office not to engage in political activity on government time to conceal their illegal activities. According to the indictment, elements of the crimes began when Elgin first took office in 2003 and extended through 2014.
Last year, the northern district prosecutor brought similar charges against former Lake Co. Surveyor George Van Till to which he later pleaded guilty. The state's Inspector General David Thomas sent a complaint, along with about a dozen binders filled with evidence, laying out a case for prosecution on either federal or state grounds to the offices of former U.S. Attorney Joe Hogsett and Marion Co. Prosecutor Terry Curry last February, neither of which acted upon that information. Curry denied receiving the evidence from Thomas until a reporter confronted him with evidence of an employee in his office acknowledging receipt of the evidence, at which time he acknowledged the possibility the files may have been misplaced. Hogsett has declined to comment on his inaction in the case, but he seems to have been rewarded by that decision and others. The Marion Co. Republicans appear poised to throw the mayor's race next year to him by failing to field a serious challenger to succeed outgoing Republican Mayor Greg Ballard.
Friday, December 19, 2014
Jeb Bush's Barclay's Ties One Of Many That Should Sink His Presidential Bid
It's pretty pathetic looking forward to the 2016 presidential nomination when all we hear is that the two leading front-runners for both political parties, Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush, come from two of the most corrupt political families in American history who obtained their super wealth by trading on the positions of influence in government they've wielded. An announcement this week that Jeb Bush would be forming an exploratory committee to run for president was accompanied by news he will be stepping down from an advisory position with a mega British bank, Barclays, that nets him more than a million bucks a year for a job with no clearly defined duties other being a Bush.
Barclays bank was one of the biggest beneficiaries indirectly of the TARP bank bailout money in 2008, which Bush supported as a consultant to Lehman Brothers. Barclays acquired Lehman Brothers in bankruptcy on the cheap, and he inherits all of the associated baggage, like it or not. Yesterday, Bush pounced to criticize President Obama's announcement that he planned to normalize relations with Cuba. In 2010, Barclays paid a fine of $298 million to the federal government for transactions the international bank illegally conducted with Cuba, Iran, Sudan and other countries subject to U.S. sanctions.
Bush's sordid history with banks dates way back to his first job fresh out of college. His daddy's best pal, James Baker, got him a good job working for the Texas Commerce Bank, whose board Baker chaired at the time. TCB had many prominent board members before it eventually wound up being controlled by JP Morgan/Chase, including former First Lady Lady Bird Johnson, former President Gerald Ford, former Enron CEO Ken Lay, former U.S. Rep. Barbara Jordan and Texas oil industrialist Bill Noel. The bank sent Jeb down to Venezuela where he opened up its first branch in the capacity of a bank vice president. I doubt Bush did much traditional banking down there, but I'm sure he was a valuable asset for the company that made his father--the CIA.
After Bush's father was elected vice president, he moved to Miami where he quickly became business partners with a self-made Cuban exile, Armando Codina, in a real estate development company. As a partner of The Codina Group, Bush pocketed 40% of the profits. Not all of The Codina Group's investments proved profitable, at least to the banks that loaned it money. Federal taxpayers wound up repaying most of the $9 million The Codina Group owed a failed savings and loan, Broward Federal Savings and Loan. Bush also served on the board of a Swiss-owned bank, The Private Bank, which was later seized by federal authorities after paying generous salaries to its board members who neglected their duties.
Bush was sued for stock price manipulation in his capacity as a member of another corporate board, Ideon Group, a credit card fraud notification company, after it was acquired by CUC International. The suit was later settled for $15 million. Another company Bush co-founded with a long-time CIA associate, Bush-El Corporation, which sold water pumps in Nigeria, was accused of bribery and fraud. The company was later cleared of the bribery charges but found liable for fraud. Financing for the company was supposed to have come from a private company, which instead borrowed the money from the U.S. Export-Import Bank. The Justice Department later sued the company that loan Bush's company the money for fraudulent misrepresentations for which it was later found liable. Bush, of course, pleaded ignorance of any wrongdoing and was not personally liable for the other company's actions.
See the Media Matters rap sheet on Bush's shady financial dealing here. Believe me, that's only the tip of the iceberg. This guy has more shady dealings in his past than just about any person the Republicans could nominate, including many associations with known drug traffickers in south Florida, who have been very generous past campaign contributors dating back to his early days in Miami as the Chairman of the Dade Co. Republican Party. Yes, the evidence proves Jeb Bush was in deep in the Iran-Contra affair his father helped orchestrate from the shadows. Most of Bush's businesses with which Bush has been associated often have the hallmarks of being CIA front companies just like his daddy's companies. That's to say nothing about the sordid lives of his family, including his wife Columba's bust for failing to disclose $20,000 to U.S. Customs for purchases she made during a shopping spree in Paris upon her return trip, or his daughter's past arrests for prescription drug fraud and cocaine possession. The Republican Party couldn't sink much lower than to nominate yet another Bush son born to entitlement president just like their father, but as it stands today, the odds of that happening are more likely than not.
Thursday, December 18, 2014
More Law Enforcement Officers Behaving Badly
The hits to local law enforcement's reputation just keep coming. In the latest in a long line of Marion Co. Sheriff's deputies facing criminal charges over the past year, a serious felony arrest warrant was issued against another deputy this week. WRTV's Kara Kenney is reporting the arrest of Deputy Craig Ryland on rape charges in neighboring Hendricks County. The Marion Co. Sheriff's Department says Ryland has been placed on unpaid administrative leave pending an investigation.
Yet another Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department officer finds himself on the wrong side of the law. Officer Christopher Dickerson has been arrested for stealing guns during an investigation at an abandoned home in Indianapolis according to WISH-TV. Dickerson faces charges of theft, obstruction of justice and official misconduct, all felonies, in connection with the incident that arose last month. Dickerson has been placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation.
Yet another Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department officer finds himself on the wrong side of the law. Officer Christopher Dickerson has been arrested for stealing guns during an investigation at an abandoned home in Indianapolis according to WISH-TV. Dickerson faces charges of theft, obstruction of justice and official misconduct, all felonies, in connection with the incident that arose last month. Dickerson has been placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation.
Obama Pal's Chicago Friends Found Guilty Of $3.4 Million Theft
Chicago businessman Leon Dingle, Jr. received millions of dollars in federal grants to promote AIDS awareness and other health-related programs in Chicago's minority communities during the tenure of Dr. Eric Whitaker, one of President Obama's closest friends, as head of the state's Department of Health during the administration of now-imprisoned former Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Yesterday, a jury in a Springfield federal courtroom found Dingle and his wife Karin guilty of stealing at least $3.4 million to finance a lavish lifestyle for themselves, or about 2 out of every 5 dollars they received in grant funds.
Federal prosecutors told jurors the $3.4 million was a "conservative" estimate of the theft. They presented evidence the Dingles used the money to buy luxury vehicles, renovate vacation homes in Savannah and Hilton Head, South Carolina, pay yacht club expenses and gifts for other family members, including the payment of $95,000 on their son's mortgage. Their convictions bring to 13 the total number of persons charged in the public corruption investigation, including the former chief of staff to Whitaker, both of whom went to work with Michelle Obama at the University of Chicago Medical Center in high-paying jobs after their departure from the Department of Health.
Then a state senator, Obama used his close relationship with convicted political fixer Tony Rezko to land Dr. Whitaker the job running the Department of Health. Other convictions included a former Chicago state representative, Connie Howard, and Jeri Wright, daughter of Obama's controversial former minister, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who once claimed Whitaker offered him $150,000 in hush money to stop talking about Obama. There is yet another case awaiting trial.
Whitaker has not been indicted, although federal prosecutors during a pre-trial hearing had him declared a hostile witness, and claim he received things of value from Dingle, including concert tickets to a Toni Braxton concert in Las Vegas where both were attending the same convention. Whitaker claimed he had no knowledge of the scheme between several top department officials, including his chief of staff, and Dingle, who provided kickbacks to at least two of them in exchange for the grants. Federal prosecutors claimed both Dingle and Whitaker were involved in extra-marital affairs with Whitaker's chief of staff, Quinshaunta Golden. Whitaker accused federal prosecutors of targeting only blacks in the public corruption investigation of his office, a claim to which even Attorney General Eric Holder took exception.
Federal prosecutors told jurors the $3.4 million was a "conservative" estimate of the theft. They presented evidence the Dingles used the money to buy luxury vehicles, renovate vacation homes in Savannah and Hilton Head, South Carolina, pay yacht club expenses and gifts for other family members, including the payment of $95,000 on their son's mortgage. Their convictions bring to 13 the total number of persons charged in the public corruption investigation, including the former chief of staff to Whitaker, both of whom went to work with Michelle Obama at the University of Chicago Medical Center in high-paying jobs after their departure from the Department of Health.
Then a state senator, Obama used his close relationship with convicted political fixer Tony Rezko to land Dr. Whitaker the job running the Department of Health. Other convictions included a former Chicago state representative, Connie Howard, and Jeri Wright, daughter of Obama's controversial former minister, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who once claimed Whitaker offered him $150,000 in hush money to stop talking about Obama. There is yet another case awaiting trial.
Whitaker has not been indicted, although federal prosecutors during a pre-trial hearing had him declared a hostile witness, and claim he received things of value from Dingle, including concert tickets to a Toni Braxton concert in Las Vegas where both were attending the same convention. Whitaker claimed he had no knowledge of the scheme between several top department officials, including his chief of staff, and Dingle, who provided kickbacks to at least two of them in exchange for the grants. Federal prosecutors claimed both Dingle and Whitaker were involved in extra-marital affairs with Whitaker's chief of staff, Quinshaunta Golden. Whitaker accused federal prosecutors of targeting only blacks in the public corruption investigation of his office, a claim to which even Attorney General Eric Holder took exception.
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
Obama Right To Normalize Relations With Cuba
There aren't many foreign policy decisions Barack Obama has made since becoming president with which I agree, but his decision to normalize relations with Cuba after 55 years makes more sense than any Cuban-related policy imposed by successive presidents since John F. Kennedy. The only sad part of today's announcement is that it coincided with a negotiated release of a presumed CIA agent, Alan Gross, who has been imprisoned in Cuba for the past five years. Gross had been convicted of crimes against the state after being caught distributing computer equipment while working under the cover of a USAID worker, a renowned CIA front group whose programs are barred by the Cuban government for good reason.
Under the new policy announced by Obama today, a U.S. embassy will be re-established in Havana, and the decades-old travel and commerce restrictions will be eased. Cuba agreed to release other prisoners in addition to Gross, although he was obviously the most prized release in the bunch, in exchange for the release of several Cuban spies imprisoned in the United States. Obama correctly stated that more than a half-century of isolation "has not worked." "It's time for a new approach," he said. The Washington Post says today's announcement is the product of 18 months of secret negotiations between the Obama administration and the government of Cuban President Raul Castro, brother of Fidel Castro, who outlived eleven U.S. presidents before turning control of the government over to his brother due to declining health. There is a bit of irony in Fidel's tenure, given the U.S. government's sordid, botched attempts to oust him, including several failed assassination attempts and the infamous Bay of Pigs invasion by CIA-trained and funded mercenaries.
President John F. Kennedy inherited the ill-advised policies started under President Dwight Eisenhower towards the Cuban government, which only succeeded in driving it to closely ally with the former Soviet Union and other perceived enemies of the U.S. government. Perhaps the most insane plan devised by the American military-intelligence community to oust Castro from power was Operation Northwoods, a series of false flag attacks proposed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff and presented to a shocked President Kennedy for approval in March 1962. That plan included: staging assassinations of Cubans living inside the U.S.; developing a fake pro-Cuban terrorist organization based in Miami; sinking a boat load of Cuban refugees (either real or simulated); faking a Cuban attack on a U.S. jetliner; and my personal favorite, blowing up a U.S. Navy ship in Cuban waters ala the U.S. Maine sinking; and blaming it all on the Cuban government.
A sane President Kennedy, who had already begun heeding his predecessor's dire warning about the growing influence of the military-industrial complex through efforts to rein in the Nazi-like figures dominating American foreign policy, summarily dismissed the plan and replaced Gen. Lyman Lemnitzer as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for presenting Operation Northwoods to him for consideration. Kennedy had already fired CIA Director Allen Dulles and two of his deputy directors, Charles Cabell and Richard Bissell, for their botched roles in the Bay of Pigs fiasco. Many serious Kennedy assassination researchers have concluded that these very individuals played a key role in the assassination of Kennedy in retaliation for his efforts to shut down their growing shadow, undemocratic government activities under the guise of protecting U.S. national security.
Ironically, President Ford appointed Gen. Lemnitzer to the Rockefeller Commission, which was tasked with determining whether the CIA had engaged in activities on American soil in violation of federal law, and whether two key figures in the Watergate scandal, E. Howard Hunt and Frank Sturges, who both worked for the CIA on anti-Castro projects, had any role in the Kennedy assassination. Like the Dulles-run Warren Commission, the Rockefeller Commission found Hunt and Sturges free of any role role in the Kennedy assassination, a finding debunked by Hunt's own deathbed confession about his and the CIA's role in orchestrating Kennedy's assassination. President Ford, who participated in the Warren Commission cover-up, appointed George H.W. Bush to run the CIA after assuming the presidency following Nixon's resignation over the Watergate scandal. Bush, of course, worked for the CIA as far back as his first days upon graduating from Yale, including his first job at Dresser Industries (later merged with Halliburton) and his time running a company he co-founded, Zapata Petroleum, which provided cover for many of the CIA's activities in Cuba under one of its subsidiaries, Zapata Offshore, which operated offshore oil rigs in the Caribbean region only miles from Cuban waters.
In a sense, you can blame the CIA's obsession with overthrowing Castro by isolating Cuba all of these years for the loss of the Republic as founded and envisioned by our founding fathers. They started out trying to kill Castro and they wound up justifying the killing of our own president in the name of national security. The ends justify the means. Cuba beget the Bay of Pigs, which beget the Cuban Missile Crisis, which beget the Kennedy assassination, which beget the Vietnam War and the Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr. assassinations, and which beget Watergate. Later, the CIA gave us Iran-Contra and Al Qaeda, which beget 9/11 and the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars and a seemingly endless War on Terror, which beget the legitimization of torture and killing of U.S. citizens by drone attacks and the loss of our constitutional right of privacy and protections from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government. Obama should do more than normalize relations with Cuba; he should dismantle the CIA, which is what President Kennedy planned to do had he gotten the chance before they blew his brains out in Dealey Plaza on November 22, 1963.
People on the right and left have already begun criticizing Obama's decision to normalize relations with Cuba, which should tell you something about how deeply our political system is infected by this cancer consuming our country. Sen. Dan Coats, who has become a multi-millionaire courtesy of his close ties to the military-industrial complex, naturally denounced Obama's decision. Sen. Coast said the policy is "evidence that the Obama foreign policy objective is appeasement" and "rewards the Castro regime at the expense of the Cuban people." Hey, if you care about improving the lives of average Cubans, what better way could you help them than opening up the island nation to U.S. investment and as a tourist mecca once again for Americans? On the left, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Robert Menendez (D-NJ) also criticized the decision. He says Obama's actions "will invite further belligerence towards Cuba's opposition movement and the hardening of the government's dictatorial hold on its people." Go figure.
Under the new policy announced by Obama today, a U.S. embassy will be re-established in Havana, and the decades-old travel and commerce restrictions will be eased. Cuba agreed to release other prisoners in addition to Gross, although he was obviously the most prized release in the bunch, in exchange for the release of several Cuban spies imprisoned in the United States. Obama correctly stated that more than a half-century of isolation "has not worked." "It's time for a new approach," he said. The Washington Post says today's announcement is the product of 18 months of secret negotiations between the Obama administration and the government of Cuban President Raul Castro, brother of Fidel Castro, who outlived eleven U.S. presidents before turning control of the government over to his brother due to declining health. There is a bit of irony in Fidel's tenure, given the U.S. government's sordid, botched attempts to oust him, including several failed assassination attempts and the infamous Bay of Pigs invasion by CIA-trained and funded mercenaries.
President John F. Kennedy inherited the ill-advised policies started under President Dwight Eisenhower towards the Cuban government, which only succeeded in driving it to closely ally with the former Soviet Union and other perceived enemies of the U.S. government. Perhaps the most insane plan devised by the American military-intelligence community to oust Castro from power was Operation Northwoods, a series of false flag attacks proposed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff and presented to a shocked President Kennedy for approval in March 1962. That plan included: staging assassinations of Cubans living inside the U.S.; developing a fake pro-Cuban terrorist organization based in Miami; sinking a boat load of Cuban refugees (either real or simulated); faking a Cuban attack on a U.S. jetliner; and my personal favorite, blowing up a U.S. Navy ship in Cuban waters ala the U.S. Maine sinking; and blaming it all on the Cuban government.
A sane President Kennedy, who had already begun heeding his predecessor's dire warning about the growing influence of the military-industrial complex through efforts to rein in the Nazi-like figures dominating American foreign policy, summarily dismissed the plan and replaced Gen. Lyman Lemnitzer as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for presenting Operation Northwoods to him for consideration. Kennedy had already fired CIA Director Allen Dulles and two of his deputy directors, Charles Cabell and Richard Bissell, for their botched roles in the Bay of Pigs fiasco. Many serious Kennedy assassination researchers have concluded that these very individuals played a key role in the assassination of Kennedy in retaliation for his efforts to shut down their growing shadow, undemocratic government activities under the guise of protecting U.S. national security.
Ironically, President Ford appointed Gen. Lemnitzer to the Rockefeller Commission, which was tasked with determining whether the CIA had engaged in activities on American soil in violation of federal law, and whether two key figures in the Watergate scandal, E. Howard Hunt and Frank Sturges, who both worked for the CIA on anti-Castro projects, had any role in the Kennedy assassination. Like the Dulles-run Warren Commission, the Rockefeller Commission found Hunt and Sturges free of any role role in the Kennedy assassination, a finding debunked by Hunt's own deathbed confession about his and the CIA's role in orchestrating Kennedy's assassination. President Ford, who participated in the Warren Commission cover-up, appointed George H.W. Bush to run the CIA after assuming the presidency following Nixon's resignation over the Watergate scandal. Bush, of course, worked for the CIA as far back as his first days upon graduating from Yale, including his first job at Dresser Industries (later merged with Halliburton) and his time running a company he co-founded, Zapata Petroleum, which provided cover for many of the CIA's activities in Cuba under one of its subsidiaries, Zapata Offshore, which operated offshore oil rigs in the Caribbean region only miles from Cuban waters.
In a sense, you can blame the CIA's obsession with overthrowing Castro by isolating Cuba all of these years for the loss of the Republic as founded and envisioned by our founding fathers. They started out trying to kill Castro and they wound up justifying the killing of our own president in the name of national security. The ends justify the means. Cuba beget the Bay of Pigs, which beget the Cuban Missile Crisis, which beget the Kennedy assassination, which beget the Vietnam War and the Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr. assassinations, and which beget Watergate. Later, the CIA gave us Iran-Contra and Al Qaeda, which beget 9/11 and the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars and a seemingly endless War on Terror, which beget the legitimization of torture and killing of U.S. citizens by drone attacks and the loss of our constitutional right of privacy and protections from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government. Obama should do more than normalize relations with Cuba; he should dismantle the CIA, which is what President Kennedy planned to do had he gotten the chance before they blew his brains out in Dealey Plaza on November 22, 1963.
People on the right and left have already begun criticizing Obama's decision to normalize relations with Cuba, which should tell you something about how deeply our political system is infected by this cancer consuming our country. Sen. Dan Coats, who has become a multi-millionaire courtesy of his close ties to the military-industrial complex, naturally denounced Obama's decision. Sen. Coast said the policy is "evidence that the Obama foreign policy objective is appeasement" and "rewards the Castro regime at the expense of the Cuban people." Hey, if you care about improving the lives of average Cubans, what better way could you help them than opening up the island nation to U.S. investment and as a tourist mecca once again for Americans? On the left, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Robert Menendez (D-NJ) also criticized the decision. He says Obama's actions "will invite further belligerence towards Cuba's opposition movement and the hardening of the government's dictatorial hold on its people." Go figure.
Star Plays Catch Up On Regional Operations Center Investigation
For awhile, I thought the Indianapolis Star had decided to skip any coverage of the investigation of the sleazy manner in which the Regional Operations Center at a big political contributor's white elephant property on the east side came to be. What little reporting the Star has done to date has primarily been for the purpose of communicating to its readers that any investigation of the deal was simply partisan politics on the part of the Democratic-controlled council. The Star's John Tuohy finally has a story today emphasizing a point I made after reviewing the latest document dump from the Ballard administration a month and a half ago: Former Public Safety Director Frank Straub thought the Eastgate Mall site was a bad choice.
Tuohy's story, for the most part, doesn't cover any new ground than what I previously reported. He did get some comments from the building's owner about some of Straub's misgiving's about the Eastgate Mall site. One of Straub's concerns I previously discussed was an FBI raid of a business owned by one of the ROC property owners in Hazleton, Pennsylvania. That would be Marvin Slomowitz, an east coast billionaire real estate developer.
Slomowitz tells the Star the raid was "politically motivated" and he received a letter 18 months letter from the FBI clearing him. He said he was unaware Straub had concerns about the matter. "I feel sorry for my poor partners hearing now what they were against," Touhy says Slomowitz said by phone from Florida. Yeah, they're laughing all the way to the bank at just how much they were able to exploit politically-corrupt people in Indianapolis to extract a $20 million, 25-year lease a for deteriorating former Simon shopping mall they picked up on the cheap.
U.S. Representative Susan Brooks' husband's client, Alex Carroll, who has made big campaign contributions to the right people, chimed in. Carroll said he didn't know about the FBI raid of Slomowitz' business and that the raid couldn't have involved anything "significant because the FBI and other law enforcement agencies moved into the ROC in January 2012." That's not entirely true. The FBI had originally discussed having permanent space in the building, but according to testimony before the council's investigative committee, the FBI chose not to become a permanent tenant in the building. Agents may have used space at the building during the Super Bowl in February 2012, but they don't have an ongoing presence there. Councilor Ben Hunter, who received big campaign contributions from Carroll after pushing so hard for the Eastgate Mall site, insisted had nothing to do with the site selection or his support. Ballard's spokesman, Marc Lotter, says he didn't even think Ballard knew Carroll made campaign contributions. Yeah, right.
Tuohy's story, for the most part, doesn't cover any new ground than what I previously reported. He did get some comments from the building's owner about some of Straub's misgiving's about the Eastgate Mall site. One of Straub's concerns I previously discussed was an FBI raid of a business owned by one of the ROC property owners in Hazleton, Pennsylvania. That would be Marvin Slomowitz, an east coast billionaire real estate developer.
Slomowitz tells the Star the raid was "politically motivated" and he received a letter 18 months letter from the FBI clearing him. He said he was unaware Straub had concerns about the matter. "I feel sorry for my poor partners hearing now what they were against," Touhy says Slomowitz said by phone from Florida. Yeah, they're laughing all the way to the bank at just how much they were able to exploit politically-corrupt people in Indianapolis to extract a $20 million, 25-year lease a for deteriorating former Simon shopping mall they picked up on the cheap.
U.S. Representative Susan Brooks' husband's client, Alex Carroll, who has made big campaign contributions to the right people, chimed in. Carroll said he didn't know about the FBI raid of Slomowitz' business and that the raid couldn't have involved anything "significant because the FBI and other law enforcement agencies moved into the ROC in January 2012." That's not entirely true. The FBI had originally discussed having permanent space in the building, but according to testimony before the council's investigative committee, the FBI chose not to become a permanent tenant in the building. Agents may have used space at the building during the Super Bowl in February 2012, but they don't have an ongoing presence there. Councilor Ben Hunter, who received big campaign contributions from Carroll after pushing so hard for the Eastgate Mall site, insisted had nothing to do with the site selection or his support. Ballard's spokesman, Marc Lotter, says he didn't even think Ballard knew Carroll made campaign contributions. Yeah, right.
Tuesday, December 16, 2014
FBI Raids Home Of Township Fire Chief In Morgan County
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| Herald-Times Photo of Dave Allison Morgan Co. home |
The WRTV report describes Allison as "a central figure" in "a wide-ranging investigation of several individuals and multiple businesses." Allison supposedly submitted construction plans based on one proposal for a new firehouse but substituted it for another after obtaining the federal grant. This 2012 audit report by the Department of Homeland Security's Inspector General may have something related to the investigation. "Fire and Rescue's grant application states that the new fire station will be 7,100 square feet, but the plans submitted to FEMA show a structure of 23,600 square feet," the report reads. "The Chief said that he misread the question in the grant application and thought it referred to the size of the existing fire station."
The audit report indicates the fire station had been a source of controversy in the township where a number of residents opposed its construction, concerned about what it might mean for future development in the area. The Planning Commission held up granting a building permit until a number of issues had been resolved, including title to the property, which were later remedied in January 2012. The work permit for construction of the fire house, however, subsequently expired according to WRTV. Contracts totaling more than $910,000 had been awarded according to the inspector general report. In addition, the more than $76,000 in initial costs incurred for the project were deemed reasonable according to the audit report.
Allen Co. GOP Approves Resolution Calling For Resignation Of Speaker Boehner
Allen County GOP committeepersons also approved an oral resolution calling on House Speaker John Boehner to resign according to the Fort Wayne Journal-Gazette.. The written resolution approved by the local party found House GOP leaders "devoid of integrity and untrustworthy" for the "offensive and insulting" misrepresentation the leadership made to Rep. Stutzman. Allen Co. GOP Chairman Steve Shine said the resolution was meant "to send a message to Washington, from literally the Republican heartland, to knock it off." Shine said both resolutions were approved unanimously by about 70 precinct committeepersons.
Merritt Officially Says He's Not Running For Mayor
Various news outlets are reporting Sen. Jim Merritt has announced he won't be seeking the Republican nomination for mayor next year, still leaving no Republican candidate running to replace Mayor Greg Ballard (R). It looks like a repeat of the 2007 Republican mayor's race when the GOP nominated Ballard as a token candidate and withheld any support for his election until the last few weeks of the campaign when it became apparent voters were prepared to oust then-incumbent Mayor Bart Peterson. A deal was obviously made to hand the mayor's office to Democrat Joe Hogsett in consideration for his agreement to kill public corruption cases involving high-level Republicans in Indiana while he was serving as U.S. Attorney. Expect the Republicans to handpick a controllable figure to act as a place-holder in the event the unthinkable happens, and Hogsett blows the first political race in his long political career that has been handed to him on a silver platter. The notion that a real two-party system exists in Indianapolis is only a figment of our imaginations.
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