USA v. Thomas Anderson

9:00 AM 3:06-CR-00099-JWS Judge Sedwick Anchorage Courtroom 3
USA vs. THOMAS ANDERSON
TRIAL BY JURY - DAY 4


Disclosure First: Tom was a student of mine a while ago. I don't remember when I talked to him last. However, I have been disturbed by this case since the beginning. I haven't blogged about this, in part, because I can't talk about anything I learned about Tom through our student/teacher relationship which is the only relationship I've had with him. I decided I should go to court and hear the evidence for myself. What I say here is strictly reporting what I saw in court, stuff anyone who went could have seen.




First, walking up to the court building, I saw someone being interviewed. I found out in court it was Tom Anderson's attorney, Paul Stockler. Inside, security took my camera, along with everyone's cell phones, until I got out. The courtroom had seating for about 120. I got there after the lunch recess and there were about 40 people in the audience, including a German couple whose Anchorage friend brought them. It was down to about 30 when the court was adjourned at 4:30.

The Situation. The Prosecutor Joe Bottini (I assume, since I got there after introductions, but I'm going by today's ADN story on yesterday's opening statements) [correction: it was Nicholas Marsh] spent the afternoon presenting audio and (one) video tapes. On the screen on the wall were the transcripts of what was being said, a yellow highlight following along, sort of a courtroom karaoke. Most were hard to understand and read along. One juror said it was too hard to hear. The judge reminded the jury several times that the actual audio, not the transcript, was the evidence.
On the witness stand was Frank Prewitt, former Corrections Commissioner who became a lobbyist for Cornell Companies, a Houston based private prison corporation. A bit of tape would be played. Then the Prosecutor would ask Prewitt what it meant. Prewitt was an articulate witness explaining it clearly. A couple of times Stockler objected that Prewitt couldn't know what Tom Anderson or Bill Bobrick (a key person on the tape) meant. The judge agreed he could say what he understood it to mean.

The People on the Tape:
1. Prewitt was, according to the ADN story, already being investigated. He was the man with the wire. He was a lobbyist for Cornell.
2. Bill Bobrick was the main lobbyist working with the Anchorage Assembly, a good friend apparently of the Mayor, and generally a supporter of liberal politicians. He was also portrayed today as a trusted mentor and adviser to Tom Anderson.
3. Tom Anderson was a Republican legislator, in his early 40s (The other two 15-25 years older I'd guess.) As it came out in today's tapes and Prewitt's comments, he was in financial trouble, needing $2000-2500 per month just for child support.


The Line of Argument

1. Cornell Companies needed four things:
A. A certificate of need for a new prison
B. A feasibility study saying they could provide comparable prison 'service' at less cost than the State of Alaska.
C. A positive review of the Whittier Procurement (Something - can't read my notes) for a joint venture with Cornell to build the prison. Apparently some legislators had questions about the process.
D. Get the private prison money that goes to the Department of Corrections back into its own BRU. Prewitt explained that a BRU is a Budget Review Unit. Money can be moved around within a BRU by a department, but not from one BRU to another. Private prison money had been in a separate BRU, but Gov. Murkowski had changed that and Corrections then had moved money originally allocated to private prisons to other accounts. They wanted the separate BRU again so private prison funds would stay for private prison stuff and couldn't be switched to other Corrections Department needs.


2. Bobrick was proposing to Prewitt on the tape, that Tom Anderson would be a good candidate for helping get Cornell's needs met.
A. He was a legislator, in the majority party, and could get appointed to the key committees relevant to the Cornell's needs.
B. He needed money.
[Today the prosecutor was trying to build the case against Anderson and we only heard from Prewitt. What was Bobrick's motive? He wasn't going to get any money out of this based on today's testimony - though the newspapers said a while ago that he kept a chunk of the payments for himself. The evidence today suggested that this was a way for him to get Tom badly needed funds, and that Tom was a rising star and in the future he would remember who helped him.]
C. Tom was 'a closer' and would finish what he started, he could be counted on.

The Scheme: Bobrick was setting up a quarterly electronic public policy newsletter that Tom among others (Brian Rogers was mentioned) would write for. It would be bi-partisan and they would sell advertising. Cornell would buy $24,000 worth of banner ads. Prewitt, on the tape, made it clear to Bobrick that Cornell didn't advertise because they got contracts from government. Thus they had no reason to spend money on advertisements. They didn't care about the newsletter, they cared about Tom helping them in the legislature. The prosecutor asked several times - did Bobrick think this was a real venture? And the answer was, "Yes, he thought he could make money off it." But from today's testimony it seemed clear that while they might set up a newsletter, the real purpose was to channel money from Cornell to Anderson. It would go to the Newsletter company (that had different names throughout the testimony) and the company would pay Anderson. No one mentioned yet whether there eventually was such an electronic journal, and if there was, whether Tom wrote any articles. The question about whether they thought there would be a real journal might be leading up to the fact that there was no such journal in the end and which would make the payments seem even shadier. But I'm speculating now.

Anderson's Rationale On the video tape of the breakfast at the Whale's Tail at the Captain Cook Hotel - all you could see were Tom's hands - Tom was saying something like, I don't see any problem here because I'm doing these things because they are the right things to do, not because of the contract. He gave an example of working against a tax on RV Rentals. I didn't say, I'm against this because my mom rents RVs (which she did), but because I had the facts and the figures to show it was a bad idea.

Many politicians have argued that the money they get in campaign donations isn't a bribe. People donate because they want to support someone who believes the same things they believe. And there is validity to that argument. The problem here, at least with the testimony given so far, is that money is passing hands, and there are some specific deliverables - the four items listed above at (1). And the creation of a company so the money couldn't be easily traced. And no one was planning to tell anyone else that Anderson was getting paid by Cornell. I can imagine that the promise of an answer to his financial problems helped Tom rationalize that he was doing nothing wrong. Of course, that is the whole point of conflict of interest - our perceptions get colored by the conflict. Which is why telling others allows less biased minds to weigh in on the matter.

That covers the key points I got in court this afternoon. There was one more interesting tidbit that is totally irrelevant to the case. When Bobrick and Prewitt were at breakfast without Tom as part of the banter, Bobrick said about Ben Stevens (US Senator Ted Stevens' son), "He's got his father's worst qualities, but not his brains." Oh, my what we say when we don't know the other guy is taping the conversation.

Actually, there may be some relevance to Ben Stevens here. Trying to prove to the jury that Anderson's consulting contract was just a cover to pay him to do Cornell's business may be practice for the anticipated Ben Stevens trial. (Though he hasn't even been indicted yet.)

And one more comment. It must have been even more bizarre to Tom than it was to me to watch these two men, one of whom purportedly was his trusted mentor, talking about him and setting him up to do this. Does he feel betrayed? Or does he look on Bobrick as looking out for him, helping him get much needed cash? And if the evidence eventually shows beyond a reasonable doubt that Tom is guilty, what about these other two, older, much more experienced men, who set Tom up? Why do they get to bargain with the FBI? Just because Tom is the legislator? It seems what they were doing was as bad or worse. But, not all the cards have been played, so let's hold off on a conclusion.




When I walked out, the TV truck was still there across the street.

Go to next day post.