Alabama: Closing Arguments

Closing arguments set in Alabama gambling trial
By PHILLIP RAWLS

MONTGOMERY, Ala.

Attorneys in Alabama's gambling corruption trial begin their closing arguments Wednesday, with defense lawyers contending that prosecutors have failed to back up their claims that state government officials were caught up in a bribery scheme "astonishing in scope."

The trial, now in its ninth week, will have two days devoted to closing arguments. U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson has given prosecutors five hours and defense attorneys 10 hours to make their final pitches before jurors begin deliberations, most likely on Friday.

Federal prosecutors aren't commenting, but defense attorneys said they will argue that the government hasn't backed up its bold claims about rampant corruption.

"Some of the overt acts the government said it would prove, it did not prove. They did not offer any evidence whatsoever," said Lewis Gillis, attorney for Democratic Sen. Quinton Ross of Montgomery.

Ross is one of the nine defendants who were arrested in October and accused of using campaign contributions to buy and sell votes for pro-gambling legislation. Prosecutors said casino owners and their lobbyists offered millions to legislators in campaign contributions if they would vote for legislation to thwart Republican Gov. Bob Riley's efforts to shut down electronic bingo casinos.

On the day of the arrests, the chief of the Justice Department's criminal division, Lanny Breuer, said the corrupt scheming was "astonishing in scope ... a full-scale campaign to bribe legislators and others."

On trial with Ross are VictoryLand casino owner Milton McGregor; two of his lobbyists, Tom Coker and Bob Geddie; independent Sen. Harri Anne Smith of Slocomb; former Democratic Sen. Larry Means of Attalla; former Republican Sen. Jim Preuitt of Talladega; former legislative employee Ray Crosby; and former Country Crossing casino spokesman Jay Walker.

Before the case went to trial, Country Crossing casino developer Ronnie Gilley and two of his lobbyists, Jarrod Massey and Jennifer Pouncy, pleaded guilty. During the trial, the three testified about offering $2 million in campaign help to Preuitt, providing $500,000 in contributions to Smith, and receiving demands from Means and Ross for contributions as a vote on the legislation neared.

Prosecutors reinforced the testimony with wiretapped phone calls and secret recordings made by three Republican legislators helping the FBI.

Those recordings sometimes worked to both sides' benefit. In one recording, state Sen. Scott Beason of Gardendale was wearing a recording device for the FBI when he talked with fellow Republican legislators about keeping the gambling legislation from being put before Alabama voters in the November 2010 election because it could bring out more black voters and hurt GOP candidates' chances. In the meeting, Beason referred to customers of a casino in a predominantly black county as "aborigines."

The Senate passed the gambling bill on March 30, 2010. Two days later, the FBI announced its investigation of Statehouse corruption, and the gambling bill died in the House without ever coming to a vote.

FBI agent George Glaser testified in the trial that the FBI took the unusual step of announcing an investigation because Justice Department officials felt they couldn't allow "potentially tainted legislation to progress through the Alabama Legislature."

Walker's attorney, Susan James, said she expects defense attorneys' closing arguments will recall Beason's tape and Glaser's testimony and then use that to question the federal government's motive. She said that if the FBI really wanted to uncover corruption rather than simply kill the bill, it could have waited for the House to act and then cast a bigger net that covered both houses of the Legislature.

"You can't remove politics from this case," she said.

Defense attorneys were so confident about their case that they presented only one witness before resting Friday.

McGregor's attorney, Joe Espy, said the government's testimony showed that McGregor followed the long-standing political practice of giving donations to officeholders who shared his political views on gambling. "There wasn't one thing wrong with it," Espy said.

The trial has been the biggest government corruption case in Alabama since former Gov. Don Siegelman and former HealthSouth CEO Richard Scrushy were convicted in a bribery scandal in 2006.

Siegelman attorney Vince Kilborn said defense attorneys must get jurors to focus on parts of the case they have doubts about and stress that prosecutors haven't proven their case beyond a reasonable doubt.

"It's real simple -- reasonable doubt, reasonable doubt, reasonable doubt. It's in the Constitution. Jurors take it to heart when you emphasize that," he said.

No matter how the trial turns out, it won't change the fact that McGregor's casino in Shorter is closed. Gilley's casino in Dothan reopened last month under new management and with a new name, Center Stage. Its flashing Vegas-style games have been replaced by games played on plain computer screens without flashing lights. Its future is in doubt because the state attorney general has sent the operators a letter to cease using the machines, which is the first step toward trying to close them.