Alabama: Massey often wary of McGregor's bingo strategy

Massey often wary of McGregor's bingo strategy
By Lance Griffin

MONTGOMERY – While lobbyist Jarrod Massey tried to juggle the abundance of moving parts related to electronic bingo legislation in March of 2010, he thought VictoryLand owner Milton McGregor was trying to pull a fast one on him and Houston County.

Defense attorneys played a recording of a conversation captured March 14, 2010, between Massey and Ronnie Gilley in which the two believe McGregor has added monopolistic language to the bingo legislation and has sought to cut out Houston County from guaranteed locations of gambling sites if a statewide bingo referendum passed.

The call occurs not long after Massey said McGregor provided a copy of updated language to a bill that changed frequently before being passed by the Senate on March 30, 2010.

“Don’t call Milton or do anything yet. I’m gonna read through this bill entirely. But, talking with (Mark) Culver about this … this doesn’t cover Houston County,” Massey told Gilley.

“What Milton is trying to do in one paragraph, he’s trying to eliminate all the competition. That’s crazy,” Gilley responded.

Attorneys for Milton McGregor suggested Thursday that Massey and Gilley worked outside — and often around — McGregor and his lobbyists in trying to affect the passage of pro-gambling legislation.

McGregor attorney Bobby Segall suggested that Massey and Gilley often did not trust McGregor during the lobbying effort to pass the bill. Massey agreed that there was distrust at times, specifically after he received the updated language of the bingo bill March 14.

“We had a concern that we had been excluded and that it may have been intentional,” Massey said.

Segall attempted to assert that Massey and McGregor were at odds the entire legislative session over bingo bill strategy. Segall played a conversation in which Massey said “We’ve been fighting Milton the whole d**n time.”

Massey said the statement was taken out of context.

“We were fighting him as to the content of the bill, not overall passage. We wanted to get the bill passed,” Massey said.

Earlier Thursday, Segall questioned Massey about statements he made in three separate interviews with FBI agents and government attorneys. During Massey’s second interview with the government after entering plea negotiations, Massey did not characterize a March 4, 2009, dinner meeting at Garrett’s Restaurant as a ‘quid pro quo’ offer from Ronnie Gilley to former Rep. Benjamin Lewis. During his fourth interview, Massey said he believed Gilley “crossed the line.” During his sixth interview, he said he believed Gilley’s actions were “in fact a bribe.”

“Isn’t it true there are other examples of you going from ‘not much wrong’, to a ‘little bit wrong’ to ‘whoa, bad wrong’, before you got your plea agreement?” Segall asked.

“I got more specific,” Massey replied.

Segall also mentioned Dothan businessmen John Watson and John Downs, who have been opposed to gambling in Houston County. Segall tried to equate their opposition to gambling legislation to McGregor’s support of gambling legislation.

“Those were people who were politically active in their opposition to SB380 (the bingo bill). Based on your understanding and involvement in SB380, would it also be your understanding there would be no way in the world they would provide a campaign contribution to any candidate without knowing they opposed SB380?” Segall asked.

“They would have to inquire about the electronic bingo issue as a whole. Again, it’s a slippery slope,” Massey responded.