Rove and U.S. Attorney Firings Rise Again

Posted Thu, 04/24/2008 - 05:48 by standingup
Bob Secter and Jeff Coen/Chicago Tribune: Feds: Witness says Rezko tried to oust Fitzgerald At the trial of Antoin "Tony" Rezko, prosecutors revealed Wednesday that former Rezko confidant Ali Ata was prepared to testify that Rezko told him in November 2004 of a plan to pull strings with then- White House political director Karl Rove and have Fitzgerald fired. Prosecutors also sought to add the testimony of another admitted schemer suggesting that two of the state's most powerful Republican operatives wanted to take the heat off Rezko by dumping the hard-charging prosecutor. Rove's response to the new allegations via his attorney was the familiar standard "does not recall."

Comments

Rove is one $hit disturber...........

by avahome - 04/24/2008 - 06:14
Sure would be nice to be able to look at some of those emails that have disappeared. Guess we better stay tuned!

Robert Kjellander - GOP Nat'l Committeeman

by avahome - 04/24/2008 - 07:09
Wow...this guy is a real player...and dang I see Carlyle, Bear Stearns, Chicago Pension Fund. (Okay..I'm wondering how many state pension funds were invested in Bear Stearns and if that is why the government did the bailout!) Bob Kjellander and Nicholas Hurtgen: The Pension PiratesӔ
Robert Kjellander is accused of multiple questionable state pension deals in Illinois he did while working for the Carlyle Group, -snip- In 2003, Kjellander was involved in another state pension deal, this time a $10 billion bond deal with the Bear Stearns investment firm that netted him a “finder’s fee” of $809,000. When the deal came under scrutiny by the state General Assembly in 2004, neither state officials nor Bear Stearns could produce any kind of documentation showing what Kjellander had actually done on the deal, which helped sparked ongoing investigations by the SEC, Illinois Attorney General and the governor’s inspector general.
Here's another article: Feds subpoena pension fund records
Aug. 09, 2005 (AP) — Federal prosecutors investigating corruption at a state pension fund have subpoenaed records concerning $4.5 million in fees a Washington-based investment firm is paying the new treasurer of the Republican National Committee, government sources confirmed Tuesday. The subpoena calls for documents related to the fund, the Carlyle Group and Robert Kjellander, said sources familiar with the investigation who spoke only on condition of anonymity, saying prosecutors want details of the probe kept secret. Kjellander, a Springfield-based lobbyist who headed President Bush's re-election campaign in three states, was named the RNC's treasurer over the weekend. -snip - Kjellander - pronounced shuh-LAN-dur - is a member of the RNC and friend of presidential adviser Karl Rove.

College Republicans - Friends - Rove & Kjellander

by avahome - 04/24/2008 - 09:12
I found an article from the Surburban Chicago Daily Herald... http://drgoldblatt.blogspot.com/2007/08/hastert-washed-up-now.html

trial

by tiberiu - 08/21/2008 - 05:53

What did you expect? Have you ever seen an Indiana mesothelioma lawyer in action? Did you ever think more than 5 minutes about the lawsuit and what it actually means for the people involved? Well, please do...

Just like me to bring up Guam

by HeyThereItsEric - 04/24/2008 - 07:46
I searched for mentions of Rove in the DOJ Office of Inspector General's mischievous report on the demotion of Guam U.S. Attorney Fred Black (June 2006 - pdf). I've only found one possibility:
On March 6, 2002, [Michael] Williams [A member of Abramoff's lobbying team at Greenburg Traurig] sent a follow-up e-mail to Ring and Rudy stating that he needed them to "talk with the political folks" at DOJ and the White House to make sure that Black was ousted as soon as possible and to push the Patton, Boggs attorney for the position. Williams wrote that Black was "an enemy of the Governor" and was using his office to "harass" Gutierrez. Williams also wrote that Gutierrez and Charfouros favored the Patton, Boggs attorney for the position, and that "the other two" candidates were Rapadas and an Assistant U.S. Attorney from Hawaii. (p. 19)
I included the mention of the "Patton, Boggs attorney" because the report is remarkably coy in never actually the attorney's name, and because Rove's attorney Robert Luskin was at Patton Boggs (wikipedia). Yeah, it's awfully tenuous, but that's the fun. (Sadly, the timeline I constructed from this report, originally linked to this intro, now seems lost in transition)

Eric!

by cho - 04/24/2008 - 08:17
The timeline is there... try again! Such excellent,good stuff! -- You did great work! Thanks for reminding us about all that research!

Link is working! Also, Christopher Stahl

by HeyThereItsEric - 04/24/2008 - 09:21
The link worked, thanks! Since I can't comment on the old story, I'll dump a find here: Gutierrez' son-in-law, frequently referred to but unnamed in the DOJ OIG DOC, is Christopher Stahl (weak source) Stahl links to unnamed Patton, Boggs att'y.
Abramoff's e-mails reflect that by March 4, 2002, Williams had learned that Gutierrez and Charfouros favored an attorney from the Washington, D.C. law firm Patton, Boggs for the Guam U.S. Attorney position. Abramoff told the OIG that the attorney had worked with Gutierrez's son-in-law on a business matter. (p. 19, 3/04/02)
Another e-mail reflects that Williams was told on May 7, 2003, by his congressional contacts that Rapadas was on the Judiciary committee docket the next day and was expected to be "reported favorably" by the committee. Williams told Abramoff that he would inform Gutierrez's son-in-law of the development. (p. 21)
Stahl and Guam Telephone Authority (Pacific Magazine, 3/1/02)
Guam Gov. Carl T.C. Guiterrez and Chris Stahl of GIPR brief the press in Honoulu on the plan to sell Guam Telephone Authority.
From the Guam Office of the Public Auditor GTA Spends Millions on Consulting Services and Has Set Aside $8 Million for Uncollectible Accounts.
Among the factors contributing to the increase in operating expenses were the privatization efforts, which amounted to $4.1 million, product implementation for DSL and Internet development of $1.6 million and $523,000 for price and cost studies. The major consultants paid for privatization efforts were Price Waterhouse Coopers $1.2 million, Patton Boggs $1.1 million, Government Intelligence Proposal & Resources (GIPR) $1 million and KPMG $662,000.
Stahl home alone (?!?) (Wash Post 8/6/06)
Stahl, 45, a Sterling consultant, said he was initially less than pleased when his wife, Carla, sprung it on him that she was taking their daughters -- Lily, 6, and Liv, 9 months -- back home to Guam for the summer. But how could he argue? Her father, Guam's former governor, is running for his old seat and wanted his family around for the campaign.

Roxy fixed it...

by cho - 04/24/2008 - 09:28
great stuff you just added. Very interesting!

Forgot one

by HeyThereItsEric - 04/24/2008 - 09:37
UPDATE: Forgot one: Christopher Stahl bio
Christopher Stahl is the founder and President of G4i Consulting. With over 20 years of experience providing subject matter expertise in designing and implementing strategies and processes, he has helped Fortune 500 companies win over $3 billion in federal government business.
In 2003, Stahl founded and served as CEO of the enterprise software firm Synchris, Inc. (www.synchris.com), formally MAP ROI Systems, Inc. Stahl is an original founder and Chief Architect of ePipeline (www.epipeline.com), a content and software application. He is the creator of G-Force™, a capture-management process program
Stahl collaborated with local government to privatize the last publicly held U.S. territory telecommunications company, Guam Telephone Authority (GTA). ... He is frequently invited as a keynote speaker to major conferences worldwide, including the Homeland Security Industries Association Conference.
What is MAP ROI? From a firm with software integrating to the MAP ROI product:
WinAward is now integrated with G-Force from MAP ROI: The first end-to-end system for identifying, qualifying, proposing and managing Federal, State, Local and International Government contracts and grants.
Yowza.

Okay, a couple more, but I have to go to class:

by HeyThereItsEric - 04/24/2008 - 09:58
Random Stahl associate: Gary Vonderhaar One-time Senior VP at MAP ROI; Director of programs at GOVG4i as well as at G2 Intelligence & Proposal Resources, Inc. (GIPR) (where he later became general manager). He was also contact for those interested in investing in internet services on Guam
For additional information call GIPR, Inc. Gary Vonderhaar, 561/964-6215 or email garyvond@aol.com. [April 2000]
Homeland Security connection for MAP ROI: Homeland Security Industries Association Deploys G-Force by MAP ROI for Government Contracting Members Businesswire, 10/7/04

One one more: Vonderhaar Guam Tel VP?

by HeyThereItsEric - 04/24/2008 - 10:11
From a conference attendees list, so it could be a clerical error.
Next Generation Communications: Making IT Work[:] the PTC2002 annual conference seeks to focus on harnessing the complexities of the broadest range of communications technologies and services for the user.
List of conference attendees (Excel File)
Gary Vonderhaar Vice President Guam Telephone Authority 7606 Hollington Place Lake Worth FL 33467 USA (561) 964-6215 (561) 964-1062

Last one-more: TPMuckracker on MAP ROI, Conrad Burns

by HeyThereItsEric - 04/24/2008 - 10:28
Conrad Burns - Another Earmark to Remember
Burns tried to push $20 million in federal funds to a company in which Ed Buckham, Tom DeLay's former chief of staff and a close associate of Jack Abramoff's, had a financial stake. The $20 million earmark, which Burns inserted into an appropriations bill in early 2003, was to fund Guam's contract with a company called Map Roi, a software firm. Map Roi was hawking their program called GForce, which is advertised on Map Roi's website as (I kid you not) "Your complete system for winning government business."
Burns: Guam Lies
Just got a call from Sen. Conrad Burns' (R-MT) spokesman Matt Mackowiak who, in response to our earlier story, unequivocally denied that Burns had ever earmarked money for Map Roi's Guam project. This contradicts Guam Gov. Camacho's assertion that Burns had.
A friendly Guam U.S. Att'y might not look into such things... Or into the privatization of Guam Telephone...

Remember the email doc dump...re US Attorney firings

by avahome - 04/24/2008 - 08:29
Roxy kindly gave me the old investigates link for all these .pdf documents. Thought I'd do some trolling.

Regarding McCains role in the imprisonment of Abramoff

by Lathera115 - 10/26/2008 - 19:08

 

I recently discovered a new chapter to the Abramoff scandal. i was wondering around YouTube when i found these videos explaining the connections between john McCain and Abramoff. The vidoes contained vital information everyone should know before voting. The main video is
http://www.youtube.com/watcAh?v=ps2LoEmyOZI
 
There’s a lot more if you just do a YouTube search for 'Gary Chafetz'

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