Kohring Trial - Leftovers

This comment was left on an earlier post from Anonymous:

Steve-- what did you think of the story on Musser? Is he as pathetic as he seems? What a painful article to have written about oneself. I would shoot myself if I was like he is portrayed! Kyle Hopkins ADN Blog

He sounds like my ex husband of 16 years ago, "Ever since you left me my life has become an eddiface to what I am not! boo-hoo."

Well I was nearby in the cafeteria when Musser started talking to Kyle and Lisa. This is a picture of them while Kyle was live blogging the post you linked to.

Read the very end of my earlier my earlier post on what the jury needs to know. We all have to take responsibility. It's really easy to make snap judgments about people. The Government subpoenaed Musser and flew him up, he said, but in the end he didn't get called to testify. Because they weren't sure what kind of witness he'd be? Because they figured they didn't need him? Who knows? But whistle blowers tend to get creamed if they haven't planned it out carefully. He violated the rule about hanging dirty laundry in public. He outed a Republican legislator who committed numerous campaign finance violations. He said he tried to work out some other way to end what was going on. She was having serious domestic problems and she needed help, he said. Finally he went to the APOC. He also violated the norms against outing your boss. While, he never said Kohring 'fired' him, he said he was put on leave without pay until the Masek matter was settled. But he could never get in contact with Kohring again. He said his calls weren't answered, etc. He's living in Houston (Texas, not Alaska). He said someone at an oil company told him the word was he couldn't be trusted (he'd ratted on his boss, on a fellow Republican is how I understood that.) So, when your whole network blackballs you, it's hard. Not only can't you get a job through your network, he probably has trouble getting letters of recommendation. They want people to remember what happens when you break the code. This is hardball. This is like an inside guy having the tape going when everyone is relaxed and letting their hair down. Can't have that guy working here, we can never trust him.

Look at who is still chair of the Republican party in Alaska:



He's got to give up his old life and start over where no one knows who he is. That's not easy.

If you read articles and books on whistleblowing, this is not unusual. People are blackballed and even actively sabotaged when they apply for jobs.

Were his motives pure when he filed his complaint? I don't know. I asked him, why with so many people aware of what was going on, only he blew the whistle. He said he had a reason, but he wouldn't talk about it until after the verdict.

Just because there might be a characteristic or two similar to your ex-husband's, doesn't mean the rest is the same. It could be, but I prefer to fill in the missing pieces before I come to a conclusion. After all, Musser did report a sitting legislator to the APOC and she was found to have violated the rules. And for that he lost his job and was blackballed.

Maybe we should be thinking, not of Anderson, Kott, Kohring, but of Masek, Anderson, Kott, and Kohring. Then Musser would have been the first to stand up against corruption. But he always has to live with the behind the back innuendo and suspicion - was he just taken revenge for some slight?

I would say that when he did this he was either incredibly brave or incredibly naive - or maybe both.

Kohring Trial Day 7 - Closing Arguments

Sullivan made the prosecution's closing statement. He put all the facts into order and connected them to the charges. It was a strong logical case for guilty. He still needs to work on making these arguments sound like a story he is telling from his heart, not a speech he's working hard to remember and say in order. When he said, "They knew, they had a secret..." and went up to the jury as if he were telling them a secret, it seemed pretty staged. But he did put the argument together in a convincing way.

Browne spent the next hour talking about the duty of jurors, about the burden of proof and beyond a reasonable doubt ('bard' in my notes), what a " blasphemous, rude, arrogant, grandiose, intoxicated, and obsessed with power" lout Bill Allen is and used the question he tried out on reporter Lisa Demer yesterday in the federal building lobby interview you can see in the video I posted yesterday - "Would you make a critical decision in your life, based on BA’s testimony?"

He did talk about the facts of the case. He didn't make his own case. It was more like the prosecutor had set up a chess board and pieces representing the argument. Rather than critiquing how the board was set, he moved pieces around, knocked others over, dropped sand over here, added rocks, and poured syrup over the whole thing - not so much countering the prosecution's argument as totally obfuscating it. It was as if maybe he could sow enough doubt here and there, confuse the jurors about this point and that one, move the pieces around so they wouldn't be able to follow the original argument set out by the government. If he messed with things enough they wouldn't be able to find his client guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. And Sullivan stood up to object twice, and the judge sustained the objections twice.

Then Bottini got up and lit into Browne's closing, talking fluently without apparent notes, just going point after point to rebut all that Browne said. It sounded sincere, just a little exasperated at the defense attorney's allegations, and sure of his facts and conclusions.

Below are my typed notes from the trial. As usual, they are just what I could catch with my increasingly stubborn fingers. I've run the spell check, but not made any other changes. So take this with a a great deal of skepticism. This is a sketch, not a full color account. There is a lot missing, but it should give you sense of what was said.



Sullivan - to whom much is entrusted, much

VK broke this trust, he received money and other financial benefits from BA, Veco, for agreeing to perform and actually performing official acts.

….
First, the evidence
Gasline and ppt. starting point.
1. Veco view - pipeline was goose that laid golden egg.
2. Veco first had to get ppt bill passed before getting the pipeline. For every 1% increase in ppt, tens of millions of profits for oil companies
3. Veco supported the 20/20 tax rate because that’s what their clients wanted - the oil producers. They had to produce the 20%

How produce with VK? BA and RS said they went to legislature to get ppt passed. They used VK and PK. Every vote counted. Had concerns with VK.
1. K upset because ppt bill not sent to his committee. Remember sb 185 because the bill was hijacked? They have to get him to support ppt.
2. VK is anti tax. Clients agreed to 20%, but VK so extreme anti tax, that he might muck up the process. Don’t want him to offer lower taxes.

….

Phone call RS & VK I understand your tax position, but this is not the time to go crazy, not the time to go whacko.
Audio - of the phone call - don’t you dare take this opportunity to go crazy
VK I know in politics there is a lot of give and take, I would reluctantly go along if you and the producers are amenable. Feb 22

He didn’t say: I can’t do that, I can’t vote for tax increase. He says, I’ll reluctantly go along. I don’t want to screw you guys over nothing
Also talked about dinner with the three of them. Go to island pub in Douglas BA said he gave $1000 to VK, he knew VK was upset about committee assignment, wanted to get VK on the team. RS sensed this, and he got up and left while he did this. BA and RS were like a married couple, he knew what he would do. He’d done it in the past - given $.

Conversation when they didn’t know we were listening.
March 4 Video: That’s why I left you alone. I knew you did.

Allen doesn’t tell smith he gave him $1000 as a gift, or to his friend, but he gave it so he would kiss our ass. Is there anything else I need to say about the relation between Veco and VK? It’s all about getting the ppt.

About the relationships. BA and RS took VK out when it served there purposes. There was no deep bond because of Russia. REd carpet list had Allen and Smith listed as supporters, not as friends. … the only thing VK came to the party with was his legislative hat. You heard times when VK was trying to milk the lobbyists, a free meal. He knows BA has deep pockets, one of the largest corp in AK. He was playing Allen too. How would BA act if he knew that VK was making $100,000? He couldn’t tell them that, it would stop the money train. ************

They knew, they had a secret, [leaned over and almost whispers to the jury….[
March 20 audio tape. He said I’ll be there for the vote. Talking to PK If it’s needed he said he’d be there.

...He’s not representing the interests of his voters in Wasilla. He’s working for Veco.
$1000 from BA, asking job for nephew. How many times VK initiated phone calls, Hey Rick, this is Vic. Lobbying other legislator Bert Ste?? , offering amendments, modify a bill for BA and RS, lobbying colleagues, advocating good things for Veco, acting as an info source. He will pass along info from BA to others, talking on radio and tv. He actually did them.

What is official act? some think, “he votes a certain way.” It’s much broader. It could also be anything wearing his leg hat. Also agreeing not to stall a bill, not to do something.

March 30 call. Serious matter to talk to BA and RS. What did BA think? He’s coming back for money. He actually took a wad of money out of his wallet and into his pocket.

Why is VK there in the first place. It’s the middle of the session, going to head of Veco, who has the most important leg of the session and for Veco's history. They’re loyal leg is in trouble politically. Asks for their rec. to help him answer his financial problem. He’s fishing. Why going to them? Why not go to friends? Why not Mark Marlow who employed him. If he could afford $500 a month, why not go to the bank? He knows BA is is biggest financial backer, he might just give him the money. He’s already been offered a job. In VK’s words, he was just there trying to solve a problem.

What get’s decided? Nothing. ONly that it is discreet, that he’s careful, that there are ‘no red flags.’ This can’t get out into the public. BA said he tried to fix the problem, he went to his own FO to check. Said if he could have given the money he would have. But already in the newspaper about consulting contracts.

What happens immediately after he tells them about his debt? He gets two cash payments. Look at this picture [money hand off] - that’s not a loan, that’s a payoff. BA doesn’t care what he does with the money. He could buy a whole GS troop. He’s been in this hotel suite all session, just to get ppt passed.

If this is a gift, where is the gift disclosure form with ethics committee? Joyce Anderson told us he was a frequent flyer at the committee. He knows the rules. The reason why this gift doesn’t relate to his legislative status.

What can I do to help you guys? Are you close to..? Stoltz, moderately so, can you gt him. I’m not real close to Bill, close to Meyers…… Vidoe tape March 30 Who’s on finance? Holmes? I know him well. He’s unpredictable. Kelly’s probably with us. Great relationship with Richard Foster….. [Talking about various legislators ] tell us what they are thinking about. tell us where they’re at, push them into our column.
First I’ll find out where they are at, then I’ll try to move them over. I know that’s really important to you. My position is anti tax, but I understand this is an intregal part of the whole deal here. …..

Folks, they’re talking about legislators who are on the fence, on key committees, the Finance Committee. He’s working for Veco….What does he do, after the payment, after waiting to hear what happens with his nephew. Lots of phone calls reporting what he’s doing, calling Meyers

Next day phone call audio: Pam has scheduled meetings for me to tell them to pass the gov’s bill as close as possible.

The same day 3/31 - I’m falling through on the plan. Let you know I’m doing what I can. I will do the best I can to lobby for the bill, to meet all the finance committee members.

Not a coincidence that the day after they met in the suite, that he is following through with the plan. One thing - about his votes on ppt.

Browne said he never voted on ppt. He’s trying to confuse you, BA wanted to keep it at 20%. There were attempts to take it above 20% and VK voted no. They wanted him to vote no. Veco didn’t want 22%. Oil producers didn’t want 22%. VK voted consistent with what they wanted.

amendment to an amendment. Sometimes such amendments did pass, took it to higher rate. Votes were intended to defeat the higher rate - voted yes to get the rate down. When Mr. Browne tells you VK didn’t vote for ppt, keep that in mind.

Let’s talk about the end of the first special session. 22%. A few hours left. you see PK RS and BA. How do we stop this? Have BA take VK out of town. You heard the call.
They meet at McDonald. The plan changes after they talk to VK (PK?) BA says, on the way back, near the liquor store, BA takes out a wad of cash and gives it to VK. Listen when the take out the hamburgers.

PK: [talking about procedures if you left you’d be in trouble]
BA: I wouldn’t a done that to you
VK: I would have done what you requested

That says it all. I would have taken a big political hit for you uncle bill. At this point, if BA had told VK to jump, he would have said, how high?

Aaron K. seems like a good kid, but he got the job because they wanted to keep VK happy. They are concerned because he is upset about the committee assignment. At dinner, VK says aaron looking for job. RS says, Veco has internships. A month goes by. Nothing about internship. VK brings it up. They say, We need a resume. VK takes the resume. RS takes the resume. Writes a note for BA - I think I’ve got a winner here, he’s VK’s nephew. RS had never met Aaron at that time. When they see it’s from BA they’re going to hire the kid. And that’s what Ms. McDonald said yesterday. He was hired

In two short months he made $3200, making $16/hour. He’s a good kid, had a great summer.

Periodioc cash payments from BA starting in 2002. Occurred in VK’s leg office in Juneau. RS corroborated, because BA told him after the fact. He did it for two purposes, 50/50 He did feel sorry. He didn’t know he was making $100K. But he also wanted to keep him loyal. It was an insurance policy.
Cook Inlet Oil - 2003 - BA asked K to take an official act to move the bill out of his committee because VK was stalling it. No question that he thought the bill had been hijacked - memo from his office - video with Prewitt. Allen Smith told you to kick the bill and he did and it got passed.

Eric Musser. No dispute that BA give VK an earful because of EM’s complaint about Bev Masek. BA upset because one of his loyal supporters was being attacked. VK tried to get the complaint withdrawn. The fact is that the complaint doesn’t get withdrawn, but Eric Musser does.

Lyda Green. BA told VK twice not to run against LG.

Folks, I also want to talk to you about the charges, your role

Count 1: Conspiracy to commit certain crimes including bribery
C is an agreement between two or more people to commit a crime. Doesn’t have to be explicit, just agreed. It started when they started making cash payments. The evidence I covered proves he agreed to perform specific acts on behalf because of various payments. You heard about the linkage between the acts and payments. The fact that he actually carried out the acts, further proves the conspiracy

Count 2 Hobbes Act, only relates to officials
PO when he obtains money or other property in agreement to take some official action and it impacts interstate commerce.
1. Doesn’t matter if VK ever took an official act, but only that he agreed to do. We submit he did not
2. Not a defense to say I would have voted the same way, I wold have done the same things.

Proof side: No dispute. He was a public official. And interstate commerce affected. Dan Dickinson, BA and RS all showed oil companies are interstate.

He received several benefits - $1000 at pub, money near McDonalds, money in Suite, and job for Aaron K.

count 3: attempted violation of hobbes act
attempted because he didn’t actually get the money
same factors plus, VK took a substantial step toward getting the money. He took the step when he went into the room and solicited them for the money. Listen closely to that conversation and what was agreed to.

Count 4: Bribery in govt. entity receiving fed funds
$5000 or more - VK charged of taking bribes while an elected official in state of AK
not in dispute
pipeline well in excess of $5000
State received far in excess of $ in fed funding
VK did receive bribes i exchange for official acts
McDonald’s
Douglas
Suite
$17K
Job for Aaron

He violated the bond of public trust he had with his constituents. Based on all the evidence, I asked you on behalf of the US that you find VK guilty of all four charges in the indictment. Thank you very much. 9:50am

J: Mr. Browne
B: Mr. Browne has to go to the bathroom


10:05 break over

Browne; mike on. First, thank you, i’ve been watching you and you us paying attention to each other a lot, you’ve been taking notes, I appreciate the seriousness you have taken this. One of the most serious things you’ve done in your life. Your sworn oath that you would follow the law and that was your word. I will get back to that.

In the beginning a few things were disorganized because i was listening to what gov said and responded to. Same today.
Gov’s presentation persuasive if you ignore the burden of proof if you ignore

Object of persuasion is to persuade that your side is correct.
It is all right for a leg to vote for legislation supported by your supporters That is completely all right. Haliburton gives money to the Bush camp and expects attention from the Bush people. GM gives money to legislators to do things. Unions, teachers unions, give $ to legs and expect them to do things for them
Some suggestion here that that isn’t legal
We know BA Veco gave 8% of VK’s campaign funds, all reported, it’s ok.
A bribe, must be known as a bribe. And the govt must prove that to you beyond a reasonable doubt.
Gov has suggested in past and now, attempt to borrow a pickup truck that went no where was a bribe. The gov has to prove bard that was a bribe. BTW the pickup was never provided and MR. K said I’ll be happy to pay for, but it never happened anyway.

Money given for E egg incident, Mr. K knew bard that it was a bribe, not simply because Veco was a consistent supporter of his.

Mr. K has served the people of this community and state for 12 years, even after this was known he was reelected. Still going of notes from this morning. Comment about RS saying to Vic, Don’t you dare , that is strong language, I have a 16 year old boy, don’t you dare take the car out , that’s a pretty strong word, Mr. S used that term, don’t you dare use this as an opportunity to go whacko.

According to Mr. Smith, they already owned him. If the did, why threaten him that he shouldn’t go nuts. During all the transcripts, dvds, everyone in the courtroom hopes you’ll listent to them carefully, that nothing is taken out of context. You need to listen to those, to hear what is actually said.

You will hear that VK never asked for any money from BA and RS ever. He asked for a loan. In the charging docs, gov. told you they were going to prove that there was a request for Mr. K of a payment. That has completely fallen apart for the govt. No one an characterize that as a payment.

I believe Ms. Anderson said, VK had filed more requests than any other legislator, I could be wrong, follow your collective member, Ms. Anderson did not say he did not file reports. I think you need to rely on your memory and notes on that.

VK saying I will do this and lobby some of my constituents - that is all legal, nothing sinister. G. says my client mentions names, Meyers, where are those witnesses? It’s apparent to you how much resources the govt has? Have you ever been in a position when the gov is going after you? There is no bottom to those deep pockets. You saw FBI agents flown from all over to testify. $100s of thousands . Against me and him.

Why didn’t they, with all that money, have them here as witnesses. Reasonable doubt is based on a lot of things including the absence of evidence.

It seems odd that a person subject to these ramifications it seems odd that the person charged by the govt. doesn’t get the last word. When I’m done, Mr B will get up and say more. The reason is that the burden on the g is so heavy, that the people who founded this country, knew that proof bard is so strong that the govt. need two chances to rebut.
I will try to anticipate what he will say and rebut them in advance. What we say is not evidence. You need to review the evidence yourself.

I am waving the flag now. There are kids dying today in support of these principles. We believe in this system that’s why you are here. We believe in this system. Explaining to jurors, “What does not guilty mean?” It means: not proven. That, you aren’t saying mr. K is pure as the driven snow, that he didn’t use bad judgement here and there? But did the G prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt. The J said the presumption of innocent, in and of itself, is enough to say ‘not guilty.’ Not guilty means not proven, these people with all their resources haven’t proven their case.


When the judge told you at the beginning of the trial, that presumption of innocence is so important and you were sworn to.

Let me tell you what this case is not about:
Victor K. proving anything, he has no burden of proof whatsoever
Not about we, VK and I, have no burden to prove anything, and that’s how the people who wrote our Constitution meant it to be. If you’ve ever done battle with the govt. you know why. W

Not about prejudice against politicians. I think there are more politician jokes than lawyer jokes.

Not about ethical rules and regs internal in the legislature.

Not about legit contributions and fund raisers

Not about doing things for people that support you politically. If people support you politically and give you legit money, that is what you do as a politician.

Case not about assuming that a gift is a bribe, without an agreement o do something illegal. The gov attorneys say if the pol gets a gift it must be a bribe if they do anything to help. They say money was for a bribe and not what he would do in the normal course of supporting VECO.

How did we get here? It started with Prewitt who was in trouble with the law but wouldn’t admit. FP mentions that he has info about major political corruption in AK. And when the names came out, the FBI started drooling - ted stevens, ben st. DY, MR.Kott, TA, BW, VK. so the Govt threw out this big web and determined who was going to fall into the web.

But we see a big mistake was made by the gov. but they won’t admit mistake. I submit it was not until just before this trial, until gov. realized that VK didn’t vote for ppt. The case was a mistake it was falling apart, They allege it was a payment when it was a request for a loan. They said about pickup. The job for Aaron was a bribe. That’s ridiculous There case so weak, turn to that as the basis for the this case. Most people get a first job through connections. But the g is so desperate in this case that they say this was a bribe. That he knew and Aaron knew it was a bribe. When their case started falling apart they started adding things - BA gave him money since 2002, he fired Musser, he was going to run against Lyla until BA told him not to. It proves only he listens to one of his supporters.

I’m certainly not faulting the G in some of the investigations in this scandal. But let’s look at others
T stevens gets $100K for a house - thats not a summer job, an easter egg
B stevens got $250K
TA $25k I believe and a contract
PK Got $10K

That should be investigated vigorously. I asked T stevens if the work on t stevens house was a gift. He said no, it was a bribe.
Even if you believe Mr. Allen, we’re talking about money with VK that was less than it would cost to buy a plasma TV. Millions of Dollars to put him in that chair.

Compare that to BA admitting he bribed $400 K and were talking about easter eggs.

Objection:
Judge: Remember our earlier discussion, your getting close to the line

Mr. Prewitt is central casting for a sleazy lobbyist. Not only made a deal with the gov. even wanted to be paid. G. wired mr. Prewitt to entrap mr. K to entrap to admitting things he did wrong.

In the last video, Vic doesn’t look very good eating, none of us do. FP go through litany of what he was told to ask. Why don’t you ask Veco for a job? I know others have, maybe I will. What happened to Musser. Vic responds he did file a complaint and agreed Masek did things illegal and he was uncomfortable about his aide doing this.

Do you believe BA beyond a reasonable doubt. The only money is the money you say in the easter egg tape and ???? You have to rely o Bill Allen’s word.

Puts up chart. this is the jury instruction you will be given, agreed to by all parties. Judge in charge of the law, you’re in charge of the facts.

JI #13 Impeachment evidence of a witness - guilty plea is not evidence against the defendant, you have to judge BA’s testimony. Consider the extent to which his testimony may have been influenced by these factors. Examine his testimony with greater caution than other witnesses - for obvious reasons.

90% of what Sullivan said this morning depends on whether BA is telling the truth.

BTW, one of my relatives said to me long ago. True character is how you act when nobody is watching. BA on the stand, told you, if he knew he was being taped he wouldn’t have said all those things. But true character is how you act when nobody is watching.

You check their demeanor on the stand. His demeanor was pathetic. He has brain problems, Brain injury, - predated any of this. He was pathetic. What else look at for motive. He had to fire sale Veco, Seemed to want sympathy from us because he could only sell Veco for $400-million. He and his family would get only $350-million. Talk about motive. He was able to sell Veco. He was able to get $350-million for his family. More important the govt. threatened to charge his children unless he satisfied the government and did what they told him to do. If he doesn’t satisfy the agreement, then all deals are off. He also got an agreement of $500K to pay for his attorneys.

In evidence you will see the plea agreements. Please read them carefully. A lot of legal mumbo jumbo, but it does say if he does cooperate the gov. will argue to reduce his sentence? How many of us who have children wouldn’t do anything to keep them out of prison.

He’s blasphemous, rude, arrogant, grandiose, intoxicated, and obsessed with power. Apparently, making $1 billion a year was not enough for him and he wanted this pipeline passed. He brags about owning senators and res. And some he did. And some he thought he did. Would you make a critical decision in your life, based on BA’s testimony. Would you even buy a car from Mr. Allen. Seriously, think abut it.

But 90% of the govt.s case rests on BA. They want a verdict based on assumption of guilt. If someone says that in jury, the others have to say that isn’t true. we know innocent are arrested every day. And juries find people guilty every day. Maybe that will disappoint prosecutors and the press, but you need to not disappoint yourself.

How often did you hear VK saying I don’t want any freebie? Do you hear VK saying that? bstevens, kott, BW, anderson saying that.

Objection
Sustained

Did prewit give assistance for free? No he wanted to be paid. There is a prejudice that they just be guilty, but you must put that aside.

Govtl ran into two obstacles. Two 6 foot 6 obstacles
A defendant who would not role over
And a lawyer who believes in the system and believes the govt. has sadly failed in their effort to prove bard. This is the best system in the world, but only if you keep your word. The G has the burden of proof on every count individually. Every count must be looked at individually.

There is a similar instruction - #13. Same instruction for Richard Smith’s testimony

JI about conspiracy. Remember I asked BA what a conspiracy was? He didn’t know. A conspiracy. two people or more agreeing to do something illegal and one of those people takes a substantial step toward that.

J tells you in a very non legal and good way explains to you what C means. It is not necessary that they made a formal agreement or every detail. But it is not enough that they simply met, discussed things of common interest, or perhaps helped each other. You must find there was a plan. Not even enough to have common interests and do things together.

Here what it means to join a conspiracy. On the other hand has no knowledge of the C, but who acts in a way that happens to further the C. One does not become a C by joining with conspirators or knowing the C exists. You have a copy of the JI. Important to read them.

You can’t go back and work to convict Vic if you follow your oath. If the effort is to work to convict it’s the wrong way. The work must be to find if the govt has proven its case beyond a reasonable doubt. Not guilty means not proven.

When you talk about the govt has, consider the plight of mr Robert Hall. Obviously the govt has subpoenaed all of his financial records. He did not run for a senate seat, he did not fire Eric Musser. And the get Hall up and they ask him about his own financial record. That’s the power the government has. The power of the g. is overwhelming.

Never said we are sorry we misled you. That we made mistakes. But they can’t.

Govt. will suggest that I’m putting the govt. on trial or that I’m trying Mr. Al= or Mr. S. That’s not truing. I’m doing what I’m paid to do.
Huge prob with govt is because you have the exhibits. Finally Mr. Allen admitted, the final version they wanted and all the other people voted for that version and all the others did. And Vic never did.

Talk a little about Allen’s testimony when he was at the Kott trial. He paid him because he didn’t have enough money he was sleeping in his office, couldn’t by his daughter a girl scout uniform, not enough to buy a ticket to Oregon. VK told him he was having financial problems. He did not specifically ask me for any money. I just figured out what he needed and I gave it to him . Wasn’t it more than just a gift, wasn't it 50/50 - G had to remind him

In statement of facts, never says anything happening prior to 2006, nothing about prior misconduct in two places. Gov. will tell you well there was another clause about this not being all.

Similar from mr. smith. VK interviewed by FBI for four hours. Completely cooperative. Gave consent to search. took 1000’s of docs from his office. Said he had accepted pers. gifts but it had nothing to do with bribery. Used the word friendship. Talked to FBI about the loan the gov. still wants to make into a payment. Says Mr. A never offered him a consulting job. Talks about getting $100 or so for easter eggs, and that it made a very nice easter.

Mr. K told FBI that veco never instructed him on how to vote, but that Veco was a major constituent and supporter and pointed out he voted against a major bill Veco wanted.

Through the very quickly. First tape, you know my philosophy, I’m not beholden to the industry. Less govt and less taxes. Interested in restructuring. Reluctantly I might go along, I want to hear your thoughts mr. allen

Don’t you dare go crazy or whacko, but I know you will . Mr. Sullivan completely left this out. Mr. S knew VK will go whack. I know your philosophy.

J: Make it clear. If you want to watch the videos, you’ll have to come into the court room. The audio they can listen if they choose.

Conversations between S and PK. Vic’s never voted for a tax bill in 12 years. Never on tape did Vic say he’d be there. He probably said things because they were his supporters, but he thought the money was gifts.

Last one, because important. Number 11 (tape) vic says I don’t want to put any pressure on you, you are my friends, I have credit card debt because of surgery, I can’t go to credit agency because my credit isn’t very good. I need this all to be above board. I don’t want any one to get into hot water, No criticism. etc. loan, and I will make payments.

I want everything done in accordance to the law.

It has to be a real job. [takes lots of these quotes out of context] Asks Smith for $100 drunkenly slurring . GS uniform, here help with GS uniform. VK always believe it a gift.

Aaron’s job - transcript 15. Well I guess he qualifies
16 - what a wonderful time he had for easter, put all the money in the egg as you requested.

You believe that presumption of innocence is enough of ind someone not guilty. this is one of the most important jobs you’ll ever do. You promised to ….. You need to be true to your word. Be your word. 11:07


Mr. Bottini Rebuttal 11:08

Let me start by addressing earlier points Mr. B made about resources of Gov in contrast with client.

He gathered that this investigation going for some time. Prewitt over 4 years ago. Going on for years. Electronic surveillance. started in SEpt 2005 and 2006. Browne wants you to believe all these resources called down on VK. You know that is not true, a mischaracterization. This has been a long running investigation and Mr. Kohring got caught in it.

Somehow the govt. was trying to hide things from you. They didn't call this witness? Do you know how big the subpoenas are - this one page. If he thought there were witnesses you should have heard, he could have called them. He’s had all those recordings. He could have played them. its the button with the little arrow on it.

Tries to compare and contrasts VK with other names TSIt’s true. It doesn’t mean VK is less guilty. Look at all these benefits. $400K in benefits to Sen Stevens. Where did he get that? You’ll see that number in BA’s pea agreement - but that’s what they gave to all these different people, not Stevens. You should take that into consideration and think VK not guilty

He said nothing in recordings where BA brags about owning sens and congressmen. He could have played them. Accuses FP of being a sleazy lobbyist. Didn’t stop this guy from going out to dinner with him and getting his meal paid.

A loan was all they discussed. Talk about giving him a job, and sure they talked about a loan. It wasn't just a loan. He just wanted to solve his problem. RS thought he wanted it taken care of period. Whatever it took. The considered all of those. Loan wasn't good idea. Couldn’t hire him in middle of leg. session, he need the money then Couldn’t give him cash because APO watching.

Talk a minute about Mr.A. Browne says you can't believe anything. You saw BA and his story. Motorcycle accident. Doesn’t affect his thought process, but on his speech and ability to say words Doesn’t affect thought process and memory. He built Veco from ground zero 40 years ago. 2005 pulsating corp 5000 employees $1billion in revenues.

Somehow this addled old man able to run this industry to the end. He was the Chair of the Board of Veco right until they signed the paper with CH2MHil. he has trouble expressing himself and saying words.

He drinks too much. OK, you saw the tape. Had they been drinkin. Yeah they told you that. Was he rambling and out of his head? Of course not. a little harsh language. Two of them by themselves, don’t know any one is recording. It’s rough language. But he knows what he’s talking about. We gotta gt it done. Let me give and example he says, like the other night VK, VK you get up to leave and I gave him $1000. RS says, I know you did, I d know. Ramblings of two drunks? No, they knew what they were talking about . That guy right there got $1000 bucks at the pub….

B. says Allen told you this because he has motive to say all this. Come on. He saw the tape because I knew what I’ done was illegal. He knew his hash was cooked. Handing money to a legislator in the middle of the session. Allen knew it was over right there.

He says you can’t trust anything he says because no corroboration. If mr. Allen is making this up to get leniency or curry favor from the Gov. wouldn't his story be better? He doesn’t say, Here’s $600 to move that bill. That wasn't their relationship. That isn’t what happened. He gave VK 3-4 payments between 2002 and 2006 because he felt sorry for him. He didn’t know he was pulling 80grand 100 grand a year. He also said, he’s not a stupid man. He also said I gave him the money because I wanted him to be loyal to me. He knows if he gives him money over time, he’s got a chit he can call. And he did - don’t run against green, Musser, let the bill out of committee.

Somehow BA had cut this great deal with the Govt. and part of deal was that Veco wouldn’t be prosecuted. Flat untrue. He asked for it, he knew with this cloud, it would affect the employees. He took a haircut on the sale to CH2mhill. Did he sell it for $400Million, of course, but the point is that to say that Veco was motivation to fabricate- that wasn’t part of the bargain.

MR. B talked about $500K severance from Veco, had nothing to do with he govt. came from Veco.

Talk about relationship among these people. Mr. B said the relationship was close, deep bond, at core their mutual love of Russian women. Flat untrue. No evidence. BA said never met VK’s wife or daughter. VK never met BA’s girlfriend. These guys are business associates. Not a bond between close friends exchanging gifts. It’s business. Veco’s business is about oil . VK has something they want. They have something VK wants.

Mr. K , i would submit to you, knows how to play cards. he knows what it took to get Mr. Allen into giving him things. He turned him into an ATM machine. He knew all he had to do was plant the seed in BA’s mind, that I don’t have money to do something and he would get the money. mr. K played this like a fiddle. When does he decide to go up and look for help - the debt was around for a while, the records in evidence. One of the fist thing K says is, “this could help me politically.” He knows what he’s doing, not by coincidence he picks the middle of the leg session that he does this. They have this key leg on the floor, he knows how critical, he picks this time. Any ideas how I can solve this? He then offers ideas - job, loan, payment - to solve his problem.

Interesting when you listen to these phone calls between K and S. A series. Starting about 3/19, til he tells RS I need to talk to you guys. The calls build to a crescendo. he starts telling Sm what he can do. Lobby on your behalf. Conveying the message before he gets into that room I there for you.

Why these guys? Why BA RS and Veco for help? Look at the timing. Why not Mr. Hall, he appears to be a successful businessman and they are friends.

B says there is nothing wrong with a legislator carrying the ball for someone who gives him a campaign contribution. Handing people a pocketful of cash in the middle of the legislative session isn’t a campaign contribution.

Do personal friends ask each other for gifs? No, this is a business transaction.

What does VK have these guys want? All he’s got is the sign he has on his door. He took that sign off the door and handed it to Mr. Allen, but doesn’t give it to him. He sold it to him.

they have this specific discussion about what mr. K can and will do for them. He doesn’t say, I’ll se if I can politely influence them.

Aaron Kohring got a w-s for the work he did. This guy should have gotten one too. He was a frequent flyer with Joyce Anderson. Should have had her on speed dial.

Vanderploeg tells K heres what we’re looking at, things you got for your personal benefit and campaign . AV asks can you elaborate? He pauses and says, I’ d like to think about it. Then he calls them gifts. He goes, oh o, I know where these guys are going, he switches to calling them gifts.

Ladies and Gentleman. The evidence is clear. Mr. K traded on his government office - it was all he had- for gifts and pyaments. that’s what this case is about.

Pulls out chart.

Mr. B says govt. hasn’t proven this case. We would submit the evidence proves well beyond a reasonable doubt. We have proven it beyond a reasonable doubt and he’s guilty.

J. Thank you mr. B can you remove the easel? 11?37

Now it is my duty to instruct you on the laws. Copy of these Jury Instructions in the jury room

Warm Halloween

Ran into this witch at the General Services Administration in the Federal Building yesterday after the trial.













And the half inch of snow we got the other day is pretty much gone. We even have a couple of pansies still blooming.

And when I checked the weather this morning, I saw that the temperature in Seattle and Anchorage were the same - though it looks like it will get warmer in Seattle later on.

Off to closing arguments soon.

What does the jury need to hear?

Tomorrow we get the closing arguments. What's still not quite clear?

I've been pretty conservative in my predictions in the last two trials. With the first case, when I tried to make sense of the jury instructions and then match the facts of the case to what exactly had to be proven, I figured it would take the jury a while to even figure out what their job was. And with twelve people all giving their opinions, I figured it would be several days at best.

The got the case on Friday afternoon and by noonish Monday they had a verdict. The same was true for Kott. Does that mean the juries didn't worry about the details? That they were just much faster at figuring them out than I was? Who knows? But published interviews with some jurors suggests that the tapes were the big factor. And people I've talked to in and around the trial plus others who have seen some tapes on the internet just look at me as if I'm slow when I ask what they think the verdict will be. "Just look at him taking the money in the tape" is their response.

That said, let me try to figure out where we are, without going in as much detail about the parts of the law that have to be proved - since I don't have the jury instructions.

Is he a public official? Yes, that's not a problem.

Did he get something of value in exchange for his services as a legislator? Let's see what I can reconstruct without looking at my notes.

1. He got the $1000 at the restaurant in Douglas. We know this from Allen's testimony, Rick Smith's collaboration of it, and, if I remember right, Allen and Smith talking about it on one of the tapes.
2. He got the Easter egg money - $100 from Allen and '6 or 7' (hundred) from Allen which we see on tape. But we can't really see how much Allen gave Kott.
3. Allen says he gave Kohring '6 or 7' on various occasions. We only have Allen's word on this.
4. There is the $17,000 credit card problem that Kohring asks help on. Joyce Anderson from the ethics committee told us that 'something of value' includes loans. He didn't get it, but he asked for it. I don't remember all the details of the laws, but this would seem at least to fit the extortion part.
5. There's the job he got for his nephew that was valued at about $3000. No one has presented evidence to even suggest the nephew isn't a really great guy, but it seems clear from the tapes that Kohring asked Allen about getting Aaron a job, he got the resume into Allen, and Smith notified Kohring that Aaron got the job. Kohring notified Aaron. And today Kari McDonald told us it was highly unlikely that Aaron would have gotten a job without the recommendation from Allen.
6. There's the truck that Kohring asked for help on, which also went nowhere.

So, what legislative actions did they get in return? And as I recall the law says it doesn't matter if a) he would have performed them in the same way without the 'payment' or b) if he doesn't actually carry out the promises.

Kohring made promises all the time. What can I do for you? Let me know if you need anything. And he did this almost simultaneously with saying thank you for something he was being given. Did he actually promise or do something concrete that would show Allen's influence?
1) It seems like Allen was able to get Kohring to release HB 195 from committee, even though he was angry because he thought his credit for the bill was being hijacked by Tom Wagoner. This may not be completely clear. The linkage needs to be made simply.
2) Allen did have clear influence on Kohring in regard to his aide Eric Musser. He did check and try to get the complaint withdrawn but felt it was too late. This all was clearly spelled out in the Prewitt tape. Whether he actually fired Musser is not clear. It was mentioned that Musser has tried to get his job back, but what I remember is from Bottini or Sullivan, not from a witness.
3) He offered to lobby other legislators and said he did - like Kevin Meyers.
4) I think Browne has done an effective job in obfuscating Kohring's voting record on PPT. In the Kott case it was clear from the detailed review of the House Journal that Kott actually changed his vote from 'no' to 'yes' at the end. But the defense used up lots of time to set up the jury for this. I don't know how the prosecution will handle this, in part, because I'm still not sure whether his votes on ppt reflect Allen's influence or not. Minimally, there are statements where he promises to be there for them. Despite Kott's skepticism.

I've got class tonight, so I don't have time to do the same with the defense's attack on the evidence.

I will say, though, that the jury this time took a lot more notes, and I suspect that they will use those notes. This could mean the deliberation will take longer as they sort through their notes and compare their different takes on things. This jury is also older, and while I haven't done a good job of comparing my notes of those what juror prospects said to who actually got on the jury, my sense is there is a lot more experience on this jury. They know about how bureaucracies work. This probably isn't good for the defense.

Based on the evidence I've seen - and the jurors have been instructed not to reach any conclusions until the trial is completely over - at this point guilty seems like the right verdict. But I don't say that with the vinictiveness I read in blog comments and letters to the editor. Yes, these legislators have violated the public trust. But Kohring's constituents reelected him knowing he was under suspicion. Michael Carey's piece in the ADN today ends with:

You might look at the FBI tapes of Vic Kohring in action and decide Vic doesn't belong in jail. But I don't think anybody, including Vic's lawyer John Henry Browne, could look at those tapes and conclude Vic Kohring ever belonged in the Alaska Legislature.

Sharon Cissna told me that this was a systemic problem. All the people of Alaska share resposibility for that. We've underfunded all the watchdog groups - the ombudsman, the APOC, etc. - and we've elected politicians who pander to our basic fears and desires - no new taxies, cut government - while we've been feeding off the oil pipeline and our federal funds pipeline. If Kohring deserves to go to prison, Alaskans who voted for legislators who dismantled all the watchdog agencies, and Alaskans who didn't vote at all because it was easier to say, "They're all corrupt," bear a great deal of responsibility too.

We allowed these people to get elected - people who were beholden or quickly became beholden to rich men with agendas.

After Trial Interview - Browne and Kohring

Kohring Trial Day 7 - Defense Case Over Before Lunch

I dragged in about 40 minutes late. Aaron Kohring, Vic's nephew, was sitting outside the courtroom, having just testified. When I got in Robert Hall was testifying. A Dimond High School classmate of Kohring's, Hall owns fireworks stands in Wasilla, has been Kohring's attorney at times, as well as his friend and campaign adviser. When I got into court, the prosecution was cross examining Hall. And much to my surprise, the prosecution was asking Hall if he knew how much money Kohring had earned in 2006, and they were able to bring out the key facts that were in Sean Cockerham's ADN story this morning. That he earned about $100,000 that year, that he had a consulting contract with developer Mark Marlow, and they even asked him if the $31,000 he got in per diem was tax deductible. Hall didn't know, but the point was made.

I hadn't thought they could get this information about the $100,000 income and Marlow contract in any more. I learned afterward that they had this information all along - and were not that excited to see it in the newspaper this morning - but didn't think they could get it in as part of their case. They'd been hoping to be able to slip it in when cross examining defense witnesses. They got their chance this morning.

And Browne wasn't very aggressive in objecting and the judge allowed it.

The defense rested its case about 10:30am. But the prosecutors called a rebuttal witness to Aaron Kohring, one of the recruiting staff at Veco when Aaron was hired. Kari McDonald testified that the internship program was for college juniors and seniors, mostly in engineering. They got paired up with a mentor and got paid $16 - $20 an hour. Aaron had just graduated from high school, so he really wasn't qualified. They gave him a $16/hour job and he got a mentor, but basically he was doing manual labor helping people move from cubicle to cubicle. There is a new high school intern program, but they only make $10/hour.

When asked if Aaron Kohring would have gotten the job if Bill Allen hadn't recommended it, McDonald said, "I strongly doubt it."

Defense attorney Browne was able to get her to say, "I know they thought very highly of him [Aaron]."

And then the judge asked the lawyers when they wanted to meet in his office to work out the jury instructions (after lunch) and the closing arguments will be tomorrow morning.

Sean Cocherham's Gets Great Story

Sean Cockerham's piece in today's ADN shows some real, if obvious, journalism that the rest of missed - he checked with the APOC. He reports Kohring made $100,000 while he was panhandling from Veco. And it looks like $25,000 was one of those do little contracts in which he was paid to

"assist with the development of construction related projects, including arranging and conducting meetings, performing research, and developing plans and strategies."

Now, he may have done real work for Marlow, but if not, this could totally change the image the defense has built up of Kohring as hard working and poor. Who did nothing but respond to his constituents emails and phone calls all year. But the prosecution ended its case yesterday afternoon, so the jury won't see this.

Court Room Escape

When I looked out this morning, the street was snow free and dry. One more day I can ride my bike. I know that some people resent cyclists for various reasons - but to be out in the chilly morning air, moving my blood around and going through the woods a good part of the way, and being able to park almost at the door of the federal building - what's not to like? But there was still ice on the bike path as you can see from these two pictures on my way home. Still, this is so much better than being in a car. And for those of you in your cars, I'm one less car on the road and one more parking place.

Kohring Trial Day 6 - Defense May Not Defend

Most interesting part of the trial for me today:

Defense attorney Browne said after the jury was dismissed for the day, “Speaking candidly, I may not put on a defense.” (I’m always alert when people suddenly say they are speaking candidly. What were they doing before?) He then asked some questions about whether witnesses would be allowed to testify about Kohring’s habit of being very friendly and offering to help. After some questioning the judge said no. I’d heard at lunch from a close friend of Kohring, that his nephew was going to be called. And he said afterward he’d been told to call all the witnesses to cancel. I’m not entirely convinced. We’ll see. But if it’s true, we could be done tomorrow or Wednesday.

Today's Witnesses

Bill Allen, finished
Frank Prewitt - Former Commissioner of Corrections who is cooperating with the Government
Tom Wagoner, State Senator from District Q in Kenai area.
Joyce Anderson, Administrator for the Select Committee on Legislative Ethics.
Alan Vanderploeg, FBI Agent who led the team that searched Kohring's Wasilla office and interviewed him
Mary Jo Herrett, FBI agent who, I think I have this right, copied Kohring's hard drive.


The Issues

It's getting harder for me to sort things out. Either there was nothing particularly earth shaking - though a number of small details = or my head is turning to mush with all this.

1. Allen's credibility - I think more than anything he said, particularly in the cross examination, this was about whether Allen can be trusted as the only witness to the other times he handed over '6 or 7' to Kohring (Allen speak for $600-$700). It is hard to to be sure I haven't been tainted and my whether my judgment is objective anymore.

Browne would have us think that Allen will tell us anything because of his plea bargain agreement with the government who can recommend a significantly lighter sentence than his potential 10 or 11 years in prison. But Allen is that self made man of American mythology - pulled himself up from a crop picking, poor family to become a successful business man worth several hundred million dollars. And he didn't do it through trading, but through creating real things that were necessary for getting North Slope oil to the rest of the world. He's still proud of what he did, and he has a right to be. And he still had some of the dignity on the stand. This high school drop out stood up to Kohring's high priced lawyer and came out at least tied. Despite his cognitive problems from his motorcycle accident. But I don't know how much of my impression is influenced by seeing him in the Kott trial. I can't tell what the jury will think. (None of these comments is intended to diminish the gravity of the how he has corrpted the democratic process, but to give a sense of why the jury might believe him, despite what he's done.]

2. Gifts, loans, payments, what's the difference? Browne has been arguing from day one, that Kohring never got any payments. He got gifts from friends. The Easter egg payment was a gift from Allen to Kohring's step-daughter, whom Allen says he may have spoken to once by phone.

Joyce Anderson's testimony went right to this as she defined the requirements for legislators receiving gifts.

1. Gifts to legislators related to legislative status cannot be over $250 cumulative from the same person over a year.
2. Gifts that not related to legislative status can be over $250, but must be reported
3. Cannot receive gifts from lobbyists during the legislative session.

She also testified that Kohring had never reported any gifts from Veco, Allen, or Smith.
Does the loan count as something that needs to be reported? Well, it would if he had gotten one, but he didn't. (My comment: But for a legislator to ask for one - even though Browne took pains to point out it was a loan, not a gift or a payment - is problematic and loans fall into the category of something of value.)

However, Browne did point out that these are civil, not criminal offenses. I'm not sure how that plays out in the federal laws that Kohring is accused of violating.

I thought Anderson was probably the strongest witness of the day. She knew what she was talking about, even if Browne belittled her with a left-handed compliment

Browne: You have obviously memorized the statutes for state ethics

And when he tried to force her to say yes or no -

B: If Allen gave money to VK’s child that would be ok? Right?
JA: There is no definition about ‘related or not to legislative status’.
B: Witness is not being responsive
Judge: I thought she was being responsive but if you don’t think so...
B: If he gave a gift to the child for any amount if not related to leg behavior, it is ok, Is that correct? [I wrote down ‘behavior’ but the language she had used earlier was ‘status’ I don’t know if that is what Browne said or something I miswrote.]
JA: After a long pause….. It’s difficult to answer when you use language “related to legislative behavior” LB is not defined in statue, the determination, sorry if you think I’m not answering. If I assume that it is not, then yes.

I can't imagine how this exchange would have endeared him to the jury. She came across to me as knowledgeable and dedicated.

3. The Eric Musser Affair

We've heard bits and pieces of this since the opening statements. Browne even said he hadn't yet decided if he was going to call Musser as a witness. After what we heard today, I don't think he'd help Kohring's case.

Frank Prewitt, as part of his cooperation agreement with the government, video taped a dinner with Kohring during which he asked about Eric Musser. Kohring told Prewitt the story on tape. Musser had worked for Rep. Beverly Masek and they’d had a falling out. Musser came to work for Kohring. Then Musser filed a complaint against Masek with the APOC (Alaska Public Offices Commission) over illegal use of campaign funds. Kohring learned about this when an irate Bill Allen called to ask what was going on. Kohring checked with APOC and learned about the complaint.

Kohring on tape:

He filed complaint while he was working for me, Didn’t tell me. Bill Allen said, what is this chicken shit? Doesn’t he work for you? I called APOC and sure enough it had gone through. I was shocked. Eric didn’t even tell me. BA really liked Bev and didn’t want that to happen to her. So that was a bad thing for me to go thru and affected so many of my supporters. He wanted to get Eric to withdraw the complaint. But they already had it. She was caught red-handed..

He then listed various illegal ways she spent campaign money, including paying off her credit card bill. In his opening statement, Browne said this was about integrity. But as we hear it now in Kohring's words, he wasn't interested in making sure a legislator who had violated the law was caught. He was upset that his aide did this behind his back and helped get rid of a legislator who was a friend of Allen's. This made him look bad. Getting rid of corrupt legislators wasn't his objective here. It was just too bad about Beverly. This doesn't make him look like a man of 'integrity."

If he said he actually fired Musser over this I didn’t catch it. But what was clear was that Allen could call and make Kohring jump.

If Browne made important points in the cross, I didn’t catch them. He asked about Prewitt’s deal with the FBI, and kept asking things like,

B: You brought up Musser, obviously they asked you to raise that.


4. He had to think about it

I'm not sure what Alan Vanderploeg's testimony added. He was a very cheerful, polite, and friendly witness. So perhaps he was there to counter any ideas that the FBI interrogation was the heavy handed third degree the Defense had suggested in the pre-trial motion to supress statements elicited from this interrogation.
However, I thought one exchange was notable.

Bottini: Tell VK about allegations at the beginning?
AVanderploeg: Told him conducting corruption probe, there were allegations he had taken money or other things of value.
JB: Did you ask him
AV: He said he had asked and received for personal benefit and campaign contributions?
JB: Did you ask to elaborate?
AV: Yes He said that he preferred to think about that question further.

Browne did a good job in the cross examination pointing out that from the written summary - I learned in one of the previous trials that the FBI policy is to NOT tape interrogations, so now we have to rely on the FBI's notes, and can't see or hear for ourselves - that the next thing was that Kohring talked about this, so he didn't think very long.

The point, as I understood it, was that at first he admitted things - not totally sure what - and then he seemed to have backed off a bit.

5. The Red Carpet List and HB 198

Mary Jo Herrett, the FBI agent who copied Kohring's hard drive when it was confiscated in the search (at one point Browne said "Before this raid" and Bottini objected, and it was sustained. Then Browne said, "Before this incursion..." and Bottini objected, and it was sustained. Finally Browne said, "Before this search,...") of Kohring's office. She produced three items from the computer, nothing as incriminating as the updated invoices for the flooring work in the Kott case:
1. The Red Carpet list - which was a list of people who, if they showed up at the office, would be shown right in. It was divided into categories in this order:
Lobbyists
Personal Friends
Supporters
Other
-Family members and relatives
-All legislators

With a Note at the bottom: This list is not in order.

What was of interest is that Bill Allen and Rick Smith were listed, not as friends, but as supporters.

2. HB 198 History (Oil Royalty Reduction for Cook Inlet Offishore Platforms)
This bill is the one we heard about where Kohring is said to have gotten upset because Sen. Wagoner had 'hijacked' it from him, so Wagoner would get credit for having introduced it and getting it passed. This seems to me so petty and trivial that I don't even want to write about it. But it fits in the prosecution's case (if I haven't mixed this up with another bill) because Kohring is said to have been sitting on the bill, and Allen was the person who persuaded him to let it out of his committee, thus demonstrating Allen's power over Kohring. Wagoner testified how his Senate version got passed out of committee and by the Senate before Kohring's identical house bill. So the Senate bill was the bill that went on to be passed. This memo found on Kohring's computer wasn't on the screen long, but it was a history of the bill and included the words "hijacked' on the memo.

3. A memo with emails setting up a meeting with Allen and Smith. First from Kohring dated Feb. 22, 2006 to Pamela Marquez asking to set up the meeting

Can you call RS and get a brief meeting including brief bite to eat at the Baranof would be good.

And her response:

I have talked with Rick today, He’ll get back to me to schedule you in.

I wasn't sure the point of this and I'm still not. But it takes place the day after Kohring talked to Rick Smith and was told, "Don't you dare go...whacko." And before the meeting where Kohring tells them he needs $17,000 because of his credit card debt. The ADN summary of the audio tape adds more insight to how strange this all is:

Kohring calls Smith, who says he's having dinner with U.S. Rep. Don Young, Veco CEO Bill Allen and Veco President Pete Leathard. Smith mentions that he would be having dinner the next night with then-Atty. Gen. David Marquez (a former lobbyist for Veco whose wife, Pam, was an aide to Kohring at the time). "So we'll be with your staff tomorrow night," Smith says, laughing. "Small world, man," says Kohring. Later, Kohring - who is strident about opposing tax increases of all forms - says he might reluctantly support the oil tax plan being pushed by Veco. Smith suggests how Kohring can justify his support then says this: "Don't you dare take this as an opportunity to go crazy, you know, to go wacko." Kohring, at the time chairman of the House Special Committee on Oil and Gas, says he'd reluctantly go along with the tax if Veco and the North Slope producers want it. (Smith and Allen testified that Allen gave Kohring $1,000 in cash two days later, on Feb. 23.)

There are other minor events - like the judge chewing out Browne for sharing Bill Allen's crib sheet with the press Friday, which was mentioned in Lisa Demer's Saturday article on Browne. Allen had a list of names to help him with his cognitive problems of getting words from his brain to his tongue. Browne had asked him what it was and if he could look at it. Then took it to the defense table. Afterward he showed it to several members of the media.

Today, after the jury left for lunch, Bottini complained about this action. At first Browne was contrite. Then he defiantly said,

I believe in a public trial.

Judge Sedwick then asked:

Did you get permission from Mr. Allen? It was not an exhibit.
In the future, you will not show things to the press without getting their permission.

Kohring Trial Day - Allen Cross Examination

Defense attorney Browne was much more polite in his cross exam this morning, most of the time anyway.

But Bill Allen proved again - as he did in the Kott trial - that he's not given up his dignity yet. He did not simply agree to everyting Browne asked. He forced Browne to wait until he found the lines Browne was asking about. Other times he simply disagreed. His long pauses seemed to try Browne's patience. At one point he asked for another headset. It was close to break and the judge had asked to hurry things along. Browned didn't want to wait. Allen retorted, "it's not my fault I can't hear." and put in his hearing aid. But it messed up Browne's pace, which had been picking up as he seemed to be trying to rattle Allen. Instead, Allen seemed to rattle Browne.

Mostly Browne was trying to get him to acknowledge that Kohring always said the money he asked for was for a loan, not a payment. The judge got irritated when Browne asked, "When he asked you for a loan, he always intended to pay it back? Right?" The judge said, well, of course, that's a tautology, rephrase the question. Browne didn't see to understand the Judge's objection, but finally figured out a different way to ask, "When he aske for money, it was for a loan, right?"

At one point Browne asked Allen about his being mad at Pete Lethard, then President of Veco, for telling the Australians who were considering buying Veco, that he was buying politicians including Don Young and Ted Stevens. That this disclosure caused them to drop out of negotiations. Allen responded, I said that, but I may have been wrong about Pete saying that.

Browne also spent a lot of time quoting Allen's profanity. He asked him whether there were two Bill Allen's - the one in front of us in his suit and the one who says fuck 52 times on the tape. Allen said, no, there's only one.

What about the Bill Allen who gives money to the Boys Club and the one in the tapes. Allen: It's the same Bill Allen.

Bottini has jumped up a few times to object to Browne reading to Allen.

I don't quite know where Browne is taking this. Even if it is a loan and not a payment, so what? If he could get a legitimate loan he should go to the bank. If he can't get such a loan, then being able to get one quicker or even at all, is a special benefit most people don't have.

He also tried to distinguish Vic Kohring from the others that Allen bribed. Well, it may be Kohring got less than the others, but so what?

This is a little disorganized, I just hae a short time during break this morning.

The Enigma that is Vic Kohring

Here's some of what his defense attorney said about him in his opening argument:

John H Browne Opening Argument uploaded by AKRaven

(audio edited from court recording posted on ADN's site today)

It's true that he's a giant teddy bear of a man. He seems to smile at everyone he looks at in court, as if acknowledging an old friend. He asks the prosecutors how their lunch was after the noon break in a cordial tone you might use with someone you know well.

I'm trying here to put down what I know from observing him in court and from what he says on the surveillance tapes that have been played.

• His legislative bio says he was born in Waukegan, Illinois in 1958.
• It also says he received a B.A. in Management Science in 1987 and an M.B.A. in 1989, both from APU.
• He's anti-government and anti-tax. (according to his attorney's opening argument and Kohring himself on some of the tapes)
• He's pro big business and certainly pro-oil development. A couple of times he called Rick Smith (all the calls that have been introduced into court are ones where Vic goes through Rick Smith to get to Bill Allen if I recall right) to tell him that he's been working on a bill that includes even more incentives than just the investment incentives for major oil companies.
  

The other side of the picture.

• He's a humble sheet rocker, when he's not in the legislature. (Defense attorney Browne)
• He lives in a trailer in Wasilla and sleeps on a couch in his legislative office in Juneau. (Browne)
• He did not have enough money to eat. (Browne quoting Bill Allen)
• The only employment his legislative bio lists was government related - such as his legislative work and membership on the Wasilla Planning and Utilities Commission and the Alaska Housing Finance Corporation
• The only heading his legislative bio lists related to business is "Business and Professional Memberships" which include just: Palmer Chamber of Commerce and Wasilla Chamber of Commerce.
  

So, that means we have an anti-tax, anti-government, pro-big oil, and presumably pro-business in general man with undergraduate and graduate degrees in business, who on his professional legislative resume lists no private sector work in his 49 years. And by all accounts he has very little money - he lives in a trailer and while in Juneau from January to May, sleeps on the couch in his office. Some of that poverty might be explained by the fact that he is supporting, presumably, the household of his wife and step-daughter who live in Oregon. Of course, explaining that as the reason for his not having enough money to eat is a little embarrassing since he's supposed to maintain a residence in his district. But since he lives in a trailer in his district and most other legislators have to support two households while in Juneau, that doesn't really explain it.

What about his sheet rock business? We know from the previous trial that Pete Kott continued to be active, when the legislature was not in session, installing hardwood floors. And his legislative bio lists him as " Owner & Associate, Kott's Hardwood Flooring: 1996 - present" though his business support was tempered by his pro-union stance.

I can't see anything in Kohring's bio that accounts for the time between his high school graduation in 1976 and his graduation from college in 1987. Was he in college for 11 years? Was this when he did sheet rock work? And there were four or five years from when he received his MBA in 1989 until he was elected to the House of Representatives. Did he start a business? What did he do? It isn't reflected on his legislative bio. Why not? Wouldn't such a pro-business candidate want to emphasize his private sector work experience?

Why does such a strongly anti-government advocate only list government work on his official bio?
What influences in his life have led him to be a staunch supporter of business on the one hand, and a state legislator who is so poor he sleeps on his couch in his legislative office? A vow of poverty may be a noble thing, but I can't recall it being part of a pro-capitalist ideology. And the ideology doesn't fit with someone taking cash handouts from lobbyists. He said in a surveillance tape when he asked Allen for a loan to cover his credit card debt that he didn't want any payments that he didn't work for. What non-legislative work did he do for Allen in exchange for the $600 to $700 we saw on the video, not to mention the other times Allen says he gave him money because he felt sorry for him?


Browne called him one of the hardest workers in the history of the Alaska legislature, ever. Surely such a hard worker with an MBA could have earned enough money when the legislature was not in session to live off his $24,000 legislative pay plus more than $150 per diem. Do Alaskans really want people managing the state's budget who can't manage their own personal budgets? Here's a staunch anti-government, no-tax zealot, who won't vote for any legislation that raises taxes, even though the oil companies being taxed support the bill. He did say he would be willing to vote for it if the assessment of 20% were called a fee instead of a tax.

This is a man, it seems to me, who has painted himself into a corner by signing a no-tax increase pledge. In the 2006 session he was faced with what he sees as legislation necessary to develop the gas pipeline, which he sees as critical for the state. But he can't vote for it because he signed the no tax increase pledge 12 years earlier, though it's ok to tell others to vote for it. It's commendable for a politician to stick to his promise. But not when it's a promise that now is going to do harm to the state and people of Alaska. It made more sense to him to stick to a principle he espoused before he had any legislative experience or apparently business experience than to say, "After 12 years in the legislature, I now realize that life is more complex than I thought. There are times when voting against a tax will do more harm than the tax will do. Since the oil producers - the people being taxed here - are saying this bill is essential to getting the gas pipeline built, I'm going to make an exception here." Nixon went to China, but Kohring couldn't vote for the PPT bill.

So we have a man of contradictions. A man with degrees in business who is too poor, despite a hefty per diem, to afford a place to stay other than his office when in Juneau. Why?
Is he simply ignoring his personal needs to earn a living in his zeal to serve his constituents?
Is he just unable to succeed in the entrepreneurial ventures he's studied and he believes in so strongly?
Are there other explanations?

He is quite unique and leaves me scratching my head trying to understand these seeming paradoxes.

[added Oct. 30 - For a similar assessment in a very different style, read Michael Carey's take on Vic Kohring.]

Kohring Trial - Opening Arguments Available

The ADN has posted the audio for the opening arguments in the Kohring Trial. Now you can see how much I left out in my post that day.

It starts with Prosecutor Joe Bottini. If you want to hear the government's case against Kohring, this is the government's story.

Bottini is followed by Defense Attorney John Henry Browne. The two opening arguments took about 80 minutes altogether. Now you can compare what Browne sounds like to the newspaper man described in today's ADN article by Lisa Demer. What does it mean when the paper writes about the defense attorney instead of about the defendant?

Richard Power's The Echo Maker

Cranes keep landing as night falls. Ribbons of them roll down, slack against the sky. They float in from all compass points, in kettles of a dozen, dropping with the dusk. Scores of Grus canadensis settle on the thawing river. They gather on the island flats, grazing, beating their wings, trumpeting: the advance wave of a mass evacuation. More birds land by the minute, the air red with calls.

So opens The Echo Maker. The sandhill cranes who congregate along the Platte River near Kearney, Nebraska on their way to Alaska play an integral role in this novel about Mark Schluter whose car lands upside down in the middle of the cranes one night and who comes out of his coma with Capgras Syndrome - a cognitive dysfunction in which he believes that his sister is an imposter.

The way the birds remember the long journey to Alaska and back each year, is a metaphor for Powers' examination of the physiological basis of memory and the tricks this physiology plays with human perception.

What does a bird remember? Nothing that anything else might say. Its body is a map of where it has been, in this life and before. Arriving at these shallows once, the crane colt knows how to return. This time next year it will come back through pairing off for life. The year after next here again, feeding the map to its own new colt. Then one more bird will recall just what birds remember.

Mark's brain concludes from the signals it receives from the sensory impressions of Karin Schluter, that this lady looks, acts, and sounds like his sister, but isn't. Karin, the sister, begins to wonder if she is the same person who was Mark's sister. Gerald Weber, the famous cognitive neurologist's brain raises doubts about his whole career and marriage from his contact with Mark and Karin.

The birds also place everything into the context of time.

The yearling crane's past flows into the now of all living things. Something in its brain learns this river, a word sixty million years older than speech, older even than this flat water.

Karin moves in with an old boyfriend while she cares for her brother after the accident. Daniel, the saintly idealist who lives to save the habitat of the cranes from developers, is the man she admires for his goodness, but who also makes her feel inadequate. Sexually, she can't resist Robert Karsh, another former boyfriend, the moral opposite of Daniel, who is now a wealthy developer planning the condos in the birds' sanctuary.

There is also the mystery of the note left in Mark's hospital room:

I am No One
but Tonight on North Line Road
GOD led me to you
so You could Live
and bring back someone else.

Throughout, the book examines the mysteries of the human brain, its evolutionary functions, and the quirky ways its dysfunctions affect people. Professor Gerald Weber is fictional, yet his famous book, Wider than the Sky, is a real book about the physiology of consciousness, written by Nobel Prize winner Gerald M. Edelman, MD, PhD, some of which can be read online.

Overall, this is a stunning book, that has taken me off into Nebraska, into Mark and Karin's world, into Dr. Weber's questions about academic publishing and the value of his life, into the mystery of how the brain works, and into the lives of the magnificent, prehistoric cranes who we are sometimes lucky to see as they pass through Anchorage on their way further north.

The Trials - Why are we doing this?

I first went to the Anderson trial to see for myself and not have to rely on the Anchorage Daily News. I wanted to know what actually happened, and if Tom was guilty, how did he get there? Everything was pretty new to me. I don't think I'd ever been to a Federal trial before. What was the protocol? Not just for the attorneys, but for the spectators, the witnesses, the press. But beyond the courtroom, what does this tell us about how our state business gets done? Why do some legislators get caught up in private side deals and sell out the public interest? How many more are doing similar or worse things, but just didn't happen to have their numbers in the address book of a tapped phone? I have no illusions that we can stop it altogether, but we can establish and maintain rules and institutions that keep it to a minimum.

These are serious questions. I know that corruption has been part of US government from the beginning, but what factors make it more or less likely to happen? Are we in a new age where our national appetite for consumption and our shorter and shorter attention spans makes us more vulnerable?

How much is this whole investigation costing? How did Alaska get high enough on the federal priority list to become active? Particularly with a Justice Department that has been excessively partisan in favor of Republicans and in an administration that is so closely tied to big oil? I suspect there's a story there.

I'm still sorting this out, but here are some thoughts so far:

The first three defendants have been people who appear to have a strong need to please. They were easy targets for anyone who wanted some pull in the legislature. Allen was an inspiring figure for Kott and for Kohring. Bobrick and to some extent Prewitt played that role for Anderson. All three were always asking, "How can I help you?" "Just let me know what you need." None of them seems to have been consciously criminal. At most they thought they were bending the rules. Anderson was most actively involved by his complicity in laundering the money he got. Kohring tended to say things like, "I want to do this right" or "I could check with the Ethics Office" and chanting those mantras seemed all the thought he needed to do to stay ethical. None got very much money and it would be unfair if they end up serving more time than Allen and Smith. But rich criminals tend to do better than poor ones.

Anderson and Kohring both needed money and could be lured by people who could help them out. Kott had $30,000 in cash in his closet, so he didn't need the money. He may have had some deep insecurity about money and thus kept such a large amount in cash at home. Who knows? I think he and Kohring both liked being in the reflected glory of Allen's power and influence.

They all believed that the people who eventually sold them out were their friends. Anderson and Bobrick just hit it off and were planning joint business ventures when Tom got out of the legislature. Kott called Allen, Uncle Bill. He spent a lot of time at Uncle Bill's house. He admired this guy who'd moved up from poverty to great wealth. Kohring also believed that Allen was his friend. And it appears that they did have close relationships and they were friends. But the real question is whether those friendships would have existed if the three hadn't been state representatives. I doubt it.

It's easy to get caught up in the day to day of the courtroom and I'm still trying to figure out an appropriate role and focus. Since I'm in the courtroom and taking notes, it seems reasonable to share what I see with others who don't have the time to be there. And I don't need to worry about how large my audience is - I'm not selling advertisements. I'm concerned though that I'm slipping into areas that aren't that relevant. I'm still trying to figure out, for example, whether my speculation about the defense attorney shed light on anything important. I'm not interested in saying anything that pops into my head, simply because I can. I have no interest in idle chit chat, just in things that help explain what is happening. I'm not as concerned about what the jury eventually decides as I am with the structure and mechanics of government and how to minimize the likelihood that politicians serve special interests instead of the public at large.

Several of us who have been at the trials will be talking on this subject Thursday at noon in the federal building cafeteria. The event is sponsored by the local chapter of the American Society for Public Administration. So some of these thoughts are warm up for that session.

Kohring Trial Day 5 - Quick PM Report

Bill Allen is 70 and he's suffering some cognitive problems from a motorcycle accident without a helmet. He's also pled guilty to felony crimes and is cooperating with the US Government on a number of cases. But he still has some of the juice that enabled him to move from picking crops to help support his family and dropping out of high school at age 15 to having sold his business for $400 million in September this year.

In this trial and at Kott's, we were told that his thinking is still clear, but he has trouble putting his thoughts into words at times. He did well for much of the testimony, but there were times with both the prosecutor and the defense attorney where he just wasn't processing. He's also wearing head phones to help him hear.

On a several occasions he wouldn't surrender to the defense attorney's line of reasoning. When Browne was trying to get Allen to admit that except for one occasion, no one else saw him give money to Vic Kohring.

Browne:The only evidence we have besides your word is the video interception where you are giving him money and you are talking about Easter eggs. Beyond that we have no evidence except what you said.
BA: That’s not true, Rick Smith knew it.
B: I’m not talking about Rick Smith. Is there any other evidence other than your word?
BA: Rick Smith knew when I was going to do it a couple of times.

At times when Allen didn't seem to be able to process what was going on, or at least couldn't articulate what he was thinking, it was like trying to reason with a small child, and Browne's voice got louder and sounded more irritated when Allen didn't answer his question at all or in ways that showed he wasn't processing.

Overall, I think the prosecution gained back some ground they lost yesterday. Sullivan wrapped up the questioning of Rick Smith and then Joseph Bottini took over when Allen took the witness stand. In some ways this was a repeat performance - the discussion of Allen's background that's in the previous post was very close to what was said in the Kott trail.

The prosecution scored points when they asked Allen about how close his friendship with Kohring was. A big point has been made that there was a bond between the two because they both were with Russian women - Kohring's wife and Allen's then girlfriend. Another link was that they both had daughters. But today Allen said he had never met Kohring's wife and that Kohring had never met his Russian girlfriend. And that the girlfriend had no children. There was other testimony that would indicate the relationship was less social than business. [jb is Joe Bottini, the prosecutor, BA is Bill Allen]

JB: When you socialize with VK. what did you do?
BA: He’d call me on the phone. I seen him a lot in Juneau.
JB Go to dinner?
BA: Yeah
JB: Who paid?
BA I did
JB: Ever met his wife?
BA No
JB: Step daugher?
BA: No
JB: Ever have a girlfriend from Russia? Way back. Kohring ever met her? NO Did Rita have a daughter? No, she doesn’t have any kids.
BA: Recall VK calling you at home?
BA: No, but at my office
JB: Know where he lived? No

But probably the biggest impact was the showing of the video tape of Bill Allen taking bills out of his pocket and handing them over to Vic Kohring. Bottini had requested permission to show the clip and Browne didn't object. You can see the tape the clip is from at ADN [at the site click on "FBI surveillance video: Vic Kohring" then go to Trial Exhibit 11: March 30, 2006. Move the bar to about 3:07:00 where they talk about Easter eggs]
[You can fast forward that little button just below the picture - it's right above the timer and sound icon above. Or you can listen to it all. It begins with Kohring talking about how he owes $17000 on his credit cards and he needs some help.]

More thoughts later, but want to get something out fairly quickly.

Kohring Trial Day 5 - Bill Allen Takes the Stand

U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska
Court Calendar for Friday, October 26, 2007

9:00 AM	3:07-CR-00055-JWS	Judge Sedwick	Anchorage Courtroom 3
USA vs. VICTOR H. KOHRING TRIAL BY JURY - DAY 5 (DEPS)

Most of the morning was going over points each side was trying to make or dispute. Smith was still on the witenss stand when I got in at 9:20am and Browne was cross examining.

How did the nephew get his job? Defense was trying to show that the 'recruiting' department was going to contact him, that he was actually recruited and went through all the proper processes for getting the job. Browne kept jumping around from topic to topic. The truck, he never got a truck from you?

They looked at the plea agreement and Browne reiterated the point that the government WILL recommend a reduced sentence if Smith cooperates sufficiently.

He continued to try to distinguish Kott from Kohring - trying to emphasize that Kott worked very specifically and hard to get the legislation passed whereas Kohring never voted for ppt. That Kott got more in payments - the flooring money, promise of a Veco job. Kohring was working for a friend. Veco paid for political polls for Kott but not for Kohring. Later prosecution was able to get Smith to say, over Browne's objection, that if Kohring had asked they probably would have done a poll for him.


I got the impression there was less tolerance for leading the witness. At one point, after allowing something that Sullivan objected to, the judge said that he was getting tired of telling the jury that what the lawyers say isn’t evidence. And the judge seemed a little testy with Browne when Sullivan had to keep objecting because "this has already been answered."

J: That goes well beyond the scope of redirect and is something you’ve covered

It ended there and Bill Allen was called in as the next witness. Bottini took over the questioning from Sullivan. Bill Allen is just an interesting guy with an interesting biography. I'll just stick my notes here. Note, as always, a lot is missing and I've often incorporated the answer into the question just to kee up. But Allen's slower speech makes it a little easier.

Not sure there is a lot here vital to the case, but it really is a piece of Alaska history. Perhaps the ADN will have the audio up tonight or tomorrow. In the mean time:

Bill James Allen, w. 11th Anchorage

Bottini: How old - I’m 70. 39 years in AK, born Soccoro NM, b. 1937 Motorcycle accident in 201. On a harley, took my helmet off, I shouldnt have. guy in front of me didn’t have break lights and I had to lay it down. Screwed up my speech.
Affect thought process? No
How affect? Sometimes I’ll saw the right or wrong word. Or sometimes can’t get it out of my mouth.
Where grow up? Oregon. Four brothers and ? sisters. I was right in the middle.
We picked fruit and hoed strawberries and stuff like that.
When moved to Oregon at 8, had you already started school? Didn’t go to school for about a year when 8. We were pretty poor, so we all had to work, picking fruit or hoeing the fields.
Eventually continued? About 9 or 10, Dad got a job in little place Lisle, Oregon and got back into school Till I was 15, Then moved back to NM with mother and brothers and sisters. I had to quit, I was a sophomore in HS, had to go back to work to support mother and other brothers and sisters.
What work? Got a job helping a welder, worked for El Paso natural gas. 15 years old.
I really loved welding and pipe particularly. I broke out, I done the tests when I was 17. That means I was a welder. It was a hard test. You had to weld an 8 inch pipe, They really take it all apart to see how well.
Did you progress to being a supervisor. About 21 or 22 forman over refinery or ? stations. I think 24 supervisor over pipe and whatever refinery, from that supervising went up to bigger jobs.
What geo part of US? New Mexico, Ok, Tx, Louisiana, went to LA and got into the union in LA, I think 250 pipe and welding union.
All oil and gas related? yes
Came to AK when? 1968. It was my wife wanted to go to AK cause her mom was here. I didn’t want to leave those positions in LA, but I told her I would, I would stay 3 months and was going back, because I thought I had a good deal in LA, and I’m still here.
When you came what kind of work? Supervision over pipe with another ??. Arco asked me to go into business with the King Salmon platform. A production platform, they produced quite a bit of oil, but of course the reserves finally quit. They may still have a little oil. Producing 54K barrels. Right out of Kenai in Cook Inlet.
Arco wanted you to do some work for them? Structural, particularly with pipe. Who were you working for? ? Little bitty outfit.called Waggly
Arco wanted me to stay there, so they asked me if I’d go into business so they could keep me? About the same time Wayne Veltry had the sparks, another platform Arco had. They asked if we could go together. When you have a shut down, you need more help. I’d help Wayne on the Sparks and he’d help me on the King Salmon. That was 68.

Name of that business? Wayne went to get it done. Wayne not good on pipe and he went into town to form the company, when he came back it was Veltry enterprises. i wasn’t sure I liked that. He went back and came back and said how about VE construction? I said fine.

At some time buy him out? wayne wanted to get out of platforms so I bought his 50%. Still VE construction? Yeah for long time, sometime in 70’s had engineering and stuff so I took VE const and it became VECO.

Still servicing the platforms Yes. arco wanted me to go up and build a pipeline in 71 or 72. It was a natural gas fuel pipeline for their camp. At Prudhoe. Was that the first work you starting doing on the Nslope? About 71.

Did VE con continue in 70s on slope? We didn’t get the oil pipeline permit and everything was kinda, wasn’t as good as it was, still had a lot of pipe work in Cook Inlet. KNew there was big boom coming in N Sea between Scotland and Norway. Started company with 50% with English company. Tar people...get some water….They were in the tar business TPTR I think.

VE const. continue in AK, didn’t shut down? I went back and forth. Same work we did on platforms in CI. A lot bigger. We done a lot a hook up, modules, it was a pretty they was a lot work, it was a boom. Started in 72 and built it up to 77, then Norwegian gov started taxing everybody. Norwegians thought they knew enough to do the oil field. Idecided time to get out and sold my half to English company I talked about.

Successful venture. Put money back on the slope. By then we had the permit to build the oilgas pipeline. Put money into camps , these shops, equipment, and it was a pretty good, timeing pretty good.

How big had VE Const grown? How many employees? Probably 2000 here in AK?
Who were clients:? BP ARco, Exxon,
Change VE cons to VECO, Continue to grow? Yeah. I bought that drilling rig company in GJ Colorado. Already had engineering, about that time brought VE construction down to VECO.

Did VEco ultimately become international? Yeah,we ah, I sold the ah drilling company and bought a ship yard in channel view right next to Houston. we built a lot of platforms in Gulf of Mexico. We still have AK, and 84, there was an agreement with unions, when building the oil pipeline and facilities ont he slope. That agreement ended in 84. they went to non-union. THen Veco got a lot of work ont he slope because we were non-uniion.

Four to Five thousand employees. Probably 50% alaska. AK always been the backbone.

BP, CPhillips (bought Arco, BP got part of ARco) and Exxon major oil partners.

2005 what role did you have in mgt of Veco? I was the Chairman. We asked about corp structure. Veco Corp, Subsidiaries?
BA: We had regions, Canada, Lower 48, Mid East, and Russia.
Bot: have a management team at V? Sr Management TEam
BA: Pete Leathard, President; Roger Conn, Overall Finance CEO Fin; Rick Smith, under me with Govt. can’t remember title; Jamie Slack, HD, saying it right? HR
Tom Corcharon, controller.

JB: 2005, total revenue?
BA: Pretty close to a billion. I think as far as private profit, 70%, 60% from AK
JB: Children
BA: Three. Mark had mgt position, maybe 8 years. At the end Tammy Carrigan was the chairman
JB: Sold Veco?
BA: Closing was 6th or 7th of September this year.
JB: While running Veco here in AK, did V get involved in politics?
BA: Yeah, I think I started in 84. the native coprs, particularly Arctic Slope they could tax the oil companies on the slope, stop permits. I thought if I didn’t get into politics the native corps would have pushed me out?
JB ??
BA: They had more horse power politically than I did, so I thought I’d get into politics.
I hired a guy as a lobbyist. Ed Dankworth. About 84.
JB;
BA: He lobbies Leg on what you’re trying to get done. Mine was oil industries. I knew if they were ok, they’d have work we could bid on.
I think Dankworth and I got crossways when we bought the Anchorage times. I wanted Ed to work with ACS, Chuck …………..can’t say his last name……………
JB Chuck Robinson? What was Anch Times
BA: Newspaper here in AK, in competition with Daily News. I think I bought it in 1989.
I wanted Dank to help Chuck, he really tried to help the Anch Times with advertising. I asked Ed if he would help him and he said no, I won’t do that, because he was … the other company. I’m sorry, drinking.
B: I have no problem with leading questions
BA: the other phone company
JB: GCI? yes

JB: Fund raisers?
BA: We done that with Ed. You organize an event and get everybody who likes a candidate. We have some food, drink, take their checks. They like the candidate, then we take the money and give that candidate, I think this thing (earphone) has quit.

J: here’s another

BA:
J: works on infra red, line of sight, if he turns his head it doesn’t work.
JB: also politically active for campaign contributions?
BA: that’s what fundraisers for.
RS came to work for us when we had the spill, when i bought the paper, he told me by that time, Ed was gone, hey, I could organize those fund raisers. I didn’t know but I let him try. He did a good job. He always done the fund raisers.

JB promoted to mgt
BA: Government Affairs, VP
JB: over the years, did you attend, become close to legislators
BA: Ramona Barnes, she’s died. John Cowdery, Pete Kott, Vic Kohring. Beverly Masek. I can go on for…
JB OK, Became active as far as individual contributions. Did Veco develop programs where senior execs were reimbursed for campaign contributions
BA: Special bonus. It was supposed to been, if they wanted to be into politics, you know, mostly the candidates would like oil industry, there was a charity, so we gave them the money, they supposed to do it or not do it. Once we give them the money it was there money. I thought it was legal. I think it really is.
Objection, there isn’t a question?
JB: Some of the execs directed to whom they should contribute?
BA: Yes they were, that’s why it didn’t work.

JB: what issues you concerned with in leg?
BA: oil tax, permits
JB: good place to stop?


Photo: Prosecutor Sullivan in the cafeteria. I'm still uncomfortable taking pictures of people who'd rather I didn't, but I don't think he can object to this one. He sat down nearby where I was writing this.

Kohring Trial Day 4 - The Afternoon

I'm going to try to hightlight some things that stood out for me. But let me warn you I didn't get enough sleep last night and my eyes are at half=mast as I write So, even more than usual, read with extreme skepticism.

Defense attorney Browne’s cross-examination of Veco VP Rick Smith seemed focused mainly on these points:

• These other guys made tons of money for sham contracts and Kohring got easter egg money.

Following up an opening argument theme, Browne highlighted how much money Smith made at Veco, and how much he got in his settlement. A lot of mocking of the $500,000 for attorney fees he got when he left Veco after the company was sold this summer.

Browne: Do you really think your attorney is going to go to trial for $500K.
Smith: I’m afraid more.
Browne: This is an ALASKA attorney? [as though this was absurd]

I happened to sit down next to John Murtagh, Smith’s attorney, because he was by the seat closest to the electrical outlet for my MacBook. I asked him how much of that was left. That was the only question I asked this afternoon he didn’t answer.

One wonders what Browne is thinking. Murtagh is representing a client with a $500,000 legal defense fund. Browne is representing a client whose credit card was maxed and collection agencies were threatening him. Which raises the question of who is paying for Kohring’s legal defense? Could that be a reason Kohring finally resigned from his house seat? Because it would have been an illegal contribution had he been a legislator? Or would it? Legal defense funds are exempt for all I know. If anyone reading this knows, please tell us in the comments and cite the law.

But back to the trial. Browne railed about the Anderson and Ben Stevens no-work Veco contracts - this time he had Stevens getting $243,250 from January 2002 to August 30, 2006. (He’d said Stevens got $250,000 per year for the contract in his opening statement.)

And all Vic got was some Easter egg money. Now, if I understand the law right (no guarantee at all) based on the prior trials, for a federal conviction there is a $5,000 threshold. We have so far:

$1000 in cash payment in the Douglas restaurant while Smith went to the bathroom.
$3000 Smith estimates the value of the internship for Vic's nephew.

There's some other cash, but it isn't clear to me how much and the evidence. I have to pay more attention and I'm too tired to go back through my notes tonight. I'm not clear on how much Easter egg money there was. Was it just the $100 bill that Allen asked from Smith? Or was there more?

There's the $17,000 problem Vic had with his credit card companies, which we have been told is solely based on his Mayo Clinic bills. The government didn't challenge that. In the video of Kohring asking for help on this (Ex. 11 I think), we have this statement from Kohring (as always, this is based on my very fallible note taking):

With Mayo clinic, my insurance didn’t cover it. Aetna only covers in West, not back East. I want everything completely above board. And please don’t feel like I’m abusing our relationship.

My state insurance plan covers care in more places than the West. Perhaps Mayo charges more than what the insurance company allows for that procedure and Kohring had to pick up the differnce, but I'm pretty sure it didn't get turned down because it wasn't in the West.

But it seems to me that for the jury, the government still has to demonstrate that this request counts. So far was we know, it never got past the request stage. I'm pretty sure that a sitting legislator going to a lobbyist and asking for $17,000 whether it is a gift, loan, or a job is pretty clearly a violation. But Browne has been pushing the point that they were friends. This argument didn't help Anderson or Kott, but they had much more damning tape that got played over and over. The prosecution, it seems, is going to have to show the jury that the job of a good lobbyist is to make every legislator feel like the lobbyist is his best friend. In any case, if the $17,000 counts, then the $5,000 threshold is met with this one item.

And then there's the truck he requested for his campaign. I Googled for Anchorage truck rentals. The tape was Aug 23, 2006. Since he needed it for the election, I figured he needed it for two months - September and October. But I couldn't book more than 40 weeks in advance on that first site, so I figured March 1-May 1 might be months with comparable prices. I'm sure Kohring could have rented a used
truck for much less in the Valley.

• How come these things aren’t mentioned in your plea agreement?

Browne had Smith go through his plea agreement with the government. This is the document he signed when he pled guilty that spells out the conditions of the deal he made with the government. It turns out there were two - a public one and a sealed one. The sealed one, apparently is now unsealed. Browne informed the Judge of this as though he thought the Judge didn't already know. There seemed to be two key points Browne was aiming at in his discussion of the plea agreement.
a. The first objective was, at least as I read it, to show that in the sealed agreement, it says that if Smith does a good job for the Government, the government will, not may, but will, request substantially reduced sentence (from the 135-180 months range listed.) Browne also established that the agreement protected Veco from being indicted, which meant that Allen could sell the company for a lot of money, and Smith could leave with lots of money. Both of these are good points. In all three cases, it would seem to me that Smith and Allen were the pushers and Kott, Anderson, and Kohring are the addicts. Are the addicts going to end up with bigger punishments than their dealers? Jurors were instructed not to think about sentences, but how can you not? The prosecution will have to make it clear that all the stuff about sentences is pure speculation and that's why they shouldn't think about it. But that assumes the defense is going to make this a part of the closing argument.

b. The second objective of going through the plea agreement seemed to be to make the point that the government was now charging Kohring with a lot of things that Smith and Allen hadn’t mentioned in their plea agreements. (Browne had to be told, as I understood what happened, to wait for Allen to talk about his plea agreement.) This all seemed to be leading to the key question Browne was raising: If it isn’t mentioned in the Plea Agreement, why is Kohring charged with it?

John Murtagh, who had a fat notebook on his lap that opened to the plea agreement pointed to a heading that read: This document does not set forth a complete statement of all relevant facts.

We can assume the prosecution knows this document pretty well.

• The battle over leading the witness, objections, and playing tapes.
  

Earlier in the trial, Browne said he noticed in the transcripts of the earlier trials, that a lot of the direct examination and cross examination questions seemed to be leading the witness. The judge acknowledged a certain flexibility that he was willing to allow if it didn’t prejudice either side and it was expedient. Well Browne has been calling the prosecution on this much more than did the defense attorneys in the previous two cases.

So I was somewhat surprised at what Browne did when he started the cross-examination. And the prosecution didn’t say much until near the end when he started to read whole sections. The prosecution did object now and then, but I think Browne got away with a lot more ‘fouls’ than did the prosecution today.

I talked about the tapes in the previous post. Not being able to play them seemed to really knock the wind out of Sullivan’s direct examination this morning. But this afternoon we saw a good example of why the tapes SHOULD be played. Browne kept reading the transcripts, but with a very exaggerated emphasis. The extreme to me was when he accused Smith of bullying Kohring as he read, “Don’t you DARE go whacko on us…” Making it sound like a serious threat. It seems to me the advantage of having the tapes is that the jury can hear exactly what the person said, including intonation. I was waiting for the prosecution to jump up and make this point. “He’s totally distorting the transcript. This is where we need the jury to hear what Smith actually said in his own voice and intonation. Not Browne’s interpretation of the transcript.” But they didn’t.

With the submission of transcripts as exhibits, the judge told the jury every time, that it was what they heard on the tape, not the transcript, that was the evidence. But Browne has now succeeded in getting the transcripts as the main evidence, not the tapes. The prosecution seems to have lost big time on this.



The paradoxical performance of Smith as a witness.

In the morning Smith spoke slowly and with a scratchy, gravelly voice. It wasn’t until the afternoon, when Browne asked Smith to explain the meaning of Perfect Storm in the context of oil and gas legislation, that he perked up and showed his stuff. He was suddenly articulate, knowledgeable, and sounded a little like the VP of a half billion dollar a year company. And from that point on he stood up to Browne, pointed out his mistakes, and didn’t allow Browne to lead him into answers he didn’t agree with. This was the Smith we should have seen in the morning when the Prosecution should have been lobbing him easy pitches. Through some bizarre switch, Smith looked, to me at least, much better in the cross examination than he did in the direct.


A follow up to yesterday's post where I asked what happened to Exhibit 14. I asked one of the Government's people if there was an Exhibit 14. The answer was no. I asked why. She didn't know, but got back to me later that it wasn't deemed relevant - it was about the nephew getting his job and they had enough on that.

Since it's world series time, I'd say we've completed the third or fourth inning. There's still a lot that can happen. I'm guessing Bottini will be pitching tomorrow for the prosecution.

Kohring Trial Day 4 - Morning Report

I didn't get enough sleep last night, and then I spent most of the lunch break talking to people, so there isn't much time left.

Morning was tedious. Prosecutor Sullivan questioned Veco VP Rick Smith about oil and gas policy. There was a closed meeting with the judge and attorneys early this morning to talk about confidentiality issues in cross examining the witnesses to protect on-going FBI investigations from being exposed. Defense attorney Browne must have also gotten in some restrictions on the use of audio and video tape.

In the previous trials, this was the point where the government played the tapes and had the witnesses interpret them. This was the most interesting part of the other trials in many ways. You would see and/or hear the witness in the tape and then hear his explanation of what was happening. But today the government hasn't played any tapes. When they tried, Browne has objected and forced them to work from the transcripts. This is not nearly as interesting or compelling. The jury did see the tapes yesterday when they were introduced, but the government doesn't look like it's going to get the advantage of playing them over and over again before the jury. This may also have put the government off its stride.

The discussion of the tax details dragged. Sullivan had his script and it sounded like he was perfunctorily reading the questions. It needed to sound more conversational, not like a list of questions he was checking off as he read them. And Smith's slow gravelly voiced responses didn't help.

And then they weren't able to show the tapes.

Score this round for Browne.

Kohring Trial Day 3 - The Tapes

I'm trying to figure how to present this. My transcription is really spotty and misses a lot. I thought about basic themes and tried to do a table and show which themes come up in which tapes. But that left out too much and would give a false impression. So I'm going to pick out some themes and give some examples of what was said for those themes. I'm sure they'll be up on ADN soon if they aren't already.

Some recurring themes on the tapes:

• Thanks for everything you've done for me.
• RV: I pace myself, at comfortable pace, sip my Tea and water, aspirins and vitamins. Some days tense with all the committee meetings
  Bill happen to get my card? I sent a thank you card?
  RS:
  RV: Isn’t he amazing to send a sick man soup? Got a heart the size of a watermelon, (Exhibit 2 or 3?)
  
• Uncle Bill, I want you to know how much I appreciate you. You’ve helped you my nephew. If I were there I’d, no I wouldn’t hug you, but give you a handshake. This is going to open up his life. I really thank you. (16)
• Thanks for the kind remarks the Voice of the Times attribute to me
  Thanks again for my nephew. Finished third week, and really appreciates it. He said, I wish I could work longer, this money is great. $24/hour. Great for 17 year old. Friends making $7/hour and he’s getting $16. People at Veco treating him very nicely (22)
• Hey Rick this is VK
  Couple things briefly, thanks for that event, very successful. $4000, expect it will be more when people send more who couldn’t attend. And thanks for Vof the Times printing my column. Thanks for them putting my stuff in.
  
  
• Anything you need from me, just let me know.
• Keep in touch with my friends at Veco, willing to help if there are any issues that come along. (Ex.1)
  
• if any need to contact me don’t hesitate to call me (Ex. 1)
• RV: Anything i can do to help, points to make in committees, radio, columns, I find myself in small minority of people who think like I do. Elephant herd coming at me, gonna be beat up.(2)
  
• Doing what I can to help you out. Doing the best I can to lobby for the Gov’s bill. Met with Kevin Meyer, good friend of mine, we get along great. Just hope that final bill is close to what the gov proposed.(13?)
  

• My nephew needs a job.
• want to call about a number of things, follow up of dinner in Douglas, possibility my nephew can do an internship with Veco
  RS: Resume? I need that as soon as possible, they’re probably already making decisions on kids. School record, gpa, work experience, etc. (5?)
• Left envelope with your name, contains my nephew’s resume you asked for and the Dittman poll on the oil industry and tax, you may already have it. Thanks for the nice dinner last night and in regards to my nephew, thank you very much. (7)
• My 17 year-old nephew will be here, want to introduce him to you. Got a bunch of lobbyists lined up to take him to dinner. (13?)
• Aaron’s [the nephew] basketball team’s award ceremony yesterday, presented them with a leg. certificate. Nephew got most valuable player award
  RS: They sent a note, saying they are planning to hire Aaron. Qualifies by turning 18 in July. One of our recruiters will be in touch with him. They have him scheduled to work with one of our engineers with the BP contract. (15)
  
  

• Here's what good things I did at the office today.
• good start for me, relationship with my constits going just fine
  Got to do the little things too, returning tel calls, responding to emals and letters, pain in the rear end, but got to do it to stay in office. (1)
• Also those extra tax credits were the direct result of my office, we worked on it for the last three months. Tax credits not only for production, but real estate, (8)

• Hey, listen, I have this situation and maybe you could help or give advice.
• ONe final thing about something importance for me, you going to be there tomorrow? Time best for you and Bill, (10)
• situation, that could hurt me politically. when I had my surgery a couple of years ago I put it on credit cards, ask you guys for your recommendations for how I can deal with this. I want to suggest, tell you guys cause your friends. Do some project where I can do some work for you or recommend me to someone. Collections company, Can’t sell my Wasilla house. They are demanding full payment for $17.000. I was paying a month. I don’t have the wherewithal to pay this. I’m living paycheck to paycheck. Not trying to come to the well, just asking if you guys would consider helping me or give me some options. (11?)
  
• Hi Rick this is VKohring in Wasilla. did you get to check into the pick up situation and if you didn’t no big deal. I can call around as well, I haven’t talked to them yet. Even if I can rent on something $1000 or so, for door knocking and putting up signs. Need to get out of this jalopy that keeps breaking down. If too many things on your plate, I understand.
  
  
• I want to do this the right way.
• I’m always looking out to the industry, not beholden, but less government is better, less taxes. (1)
• VK If I did do something for you, I’d want it real, above board never criticize our relationship or getting something I don’t deserve.
  BA: Don’t say anything til I can figure out, so it doesn’t come back to bite my ass or yours.
  VK: I wouldn’t tell anybody of financial situation. What would happen if I were to borrow money. But I don’t have to I don’t want to raise any read flags or anything.(11)
  
  

These are just a few bits from the tapes as I'm trying to see what the prosecution has in mind. Clearly there is nothing nearly as explosive as the tapes on Anderson and Kott.


Cracks in the Kohring Boy Scout Image

In his opening statement, Browne worked hard to show that Kohring was different from the foul mouthed drinkers that we would see on the tapes - Bill Allen, Rick Smith, Pete Kott. He doesn't drink or swear we were told.

But already yesterday, Kohring was heard on tape talking about drinking vodka (now that he had a Russian wife) at dinner, and that it was nice how it relieved stress. Today he twice suggested to Rick Smith they go out and have Long Island Tea. He also slipped in words like 'bullshit' 'asshole' and 'turd'. Not terrible in the big picture, but contradicting the boy scout image Browne was trying to portray.

There are a lot more items, but they'll come out when they play the tapes again with the witnesses who are in the tapes.

Kott Trial Day 3 - PM - FBI Investigation Team Reunion

The afternoon consisted of calling up different FBI agents from all around the country, swearing them in, then asking them the identical questions about whether they had verified that the material on this particular CD - Prosecution exhibits 1- 10 were in the morning, the 11-26 in the afternoon - was the same as the original recording. Then they had to verify the transcripts. (I'm not certain about #14. I had #13 down and the next one was #15. The judge asked about #14 too and the prosecution said, no, the next one was #15. So either they missed one, the judge and I missed one, or they are saving it to introduce at another time. But then they have to bring in the FBI agent again, so I probably just missed it.)

So you can look at this list: (The bulleted ones are from out of town)
Witnesses

Morning
Kelley Woodward, FBI, intelligence analyst, in Anchorage
Jessica Debra Ann Newton, FBI Intelligence analyst, Anchorage Division (twice)

• Joel Stephen, Texas Spec Agent FBI,
• William Bondurat California FBI, special agent, LA division, three years
• Tom Szot, FBI, special agent, 8 years, Chicago
• Frank DePodesta, FBI special agent, Chicago (twice)
• Joseph Thelen, retired FBI, 24 years, organized crime, NYC

Afternoon
DePodesta again

• Agent Dunphy (from yesterday)Cincinnati, 23 years FBI special agent

DePodesta again
DePodesta again
Kevin Loader, Anchorage, FBI, 2 years, special agent
DePodesta again
Joe Thelen again

• Sean McDermott, FBI special agent, 4 years Miami

Break
Chad Kadera Anchorage, FBI special agent
DePodesta again

• Roslyn B. Harris, Atlanta, FBI, 20 years, Special Agent

Jessica Newton again
Patricia A. Mumz FBI, 20 years, special agent, Anchorage

• Ingrid Schmidt, Columbus, Ohio, FBI, 5 years, special agent (Cincinnati Division)

(6 out of 14 were women -42%. Not my stereotype of FBI agents.)

As I said in the previous post, the out of town agents are here because defense attorney John Henry Browne insisted that the individual agent who was monitoring the recording had to be here to verify the recording. In the previous two trials, the defense attorneys allowed the prosecution to have one attorney verify all the tapes.

So we have nine FBI agents from out of town (the bulleted names) and five from Anchorage all gathered in the US Federal Courtroom anteroom. An FBI Investigation team reunion. In the overall scheme of what this investigation and trials cost, nine more airfares and several nights of hotel rooms is a minor costs. But there is also the loss of the work the agents could be doing in on other cases. (Some people may see it as a benefit that they aren't doing other work and I must admit that the work they've done in Alaska has reminded me that the FBI can do important work in the public interest.)

So why is Browne insisting on this? Well, for one, the FBI isn't infallible and there could be mistakes. But I suspect that the more work the prosecution has to do on this stuff, it's a little attention taken away from other stuff. And with two lead attorneys and FBI agent Kepner sitting up front, and two other attorneys sitting behind them (well, Goeke is still around, but Marsh said he was headed back to DC this week and I didn't seem him in court today), they do have things stacked in their favor. And this doesn't even mention the home field advantage: they can push their cart full of documents and equipment down the hallway and into their offices without even going downstairs and outside; they can bring in whatever staff from the building to help them in or out of the courtroom to mention just a few benefits.

By calling in all these agents, Browne is probably hoping one or two won't make it and so a tape might not be put in as evidence. We don't know if that is the case or not. He's emphasizing to the jury how many agents have been spending time on this and how much money the government is spending to bring them up here. (I don't believe the jury knows that Browne is the one who insisted on this, and I guess the prosecution can't tell them that.) Whatever extra steps the prosecution has to take, offers new opportunities for them to mess up somewhere along the line, and some bit of evidence may be lost, or some doubt could be raised among the jurors. What happened to Ex. 14 for example? Was I just not paying attention or did they actually skip it?

Browne did ask several of the witnesses where their names were on the documents. A: Not there. Well, how do you know that you were the person monitoring this? A: Well, it's somewhere. It never was clear how they knew. So there was a seed of doubt.

While the defense attorney should be doing everything he can to get his client off, if all he has are technical maneuvers that wouldn't bode well for Kohring.

OK, there was also the substantive material that was on the tapes we heard today. As I understand the process, the prosecution has to play all the tapes when they introduce them. There was really no discussion of them, other than what Bottini said in the opening arguments. And that did alert the jury to what was going to be shown on the tapes. If the previous trials are predictors, as the witnesses come in - and Bill Allen and Rick Smith (key characters on the tapes) have been mentioned - the prosecution will play the tapes again and ask the witnesses to explain what is going on.

But I'll finish this post and try to put together my thoughts about what the tapes were about today.

Jury Notes:
I saw that at some point today, every juror had a pen in his or her hand and wrote something in the court provided notebooks. Many were taking notes most of the time. This is very different from the previous two juries when I rarely saw a juror taking notes.

Eddie Haskell observation:

At the afternoon break, the defense attorney noted that he has copies of Bill Allen and Rick Smith's testimony from the Kott trial. "Would the judge like a courtesy copy?" He didn't do this in front of the jury at least.

Kohring Trial Day 3: Technical Stuff

U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska
Court Calendar for Wednesday, October 24, 2007




9:00 AM 3:07-CR-00055-JWS Judge Sedwick Anchorage Courtroom 3
USA vs. VICTOR H. KOHRING
TRIAL BY JURY - DAY 3 (DEPS)




Basically this was a technical session in which the Prosecution was introducing witnesses who verified exhibits.

Witnesses:

Dan Dickinson, former State Tax Director, and consultant on ppt tax and gas pipeline
Gave background about Alaska’s oil tax regimen and the reasons for changing it. This witness also set the context for the legislative session and special sessions. He also answered a question I ‘d had about whether PPT stood for Petroleum Production Tax or Petroleum Profit Tax. Apparently it has meant both.

Suzanne Lowell, Chief clerk of House of Reps.
Verified House Journal documents about voting on the PPT bill in the regular legislative session and the two special sessions in 2006.

FBI Agents
Kelley Woodward, FBI, intelligence analyst, in Anchorage
Jessica Debra Ann Newton, FBI Intelligence analyst, Anchorage Division (twice)
Joel Stephen, Texas Spec Agent FBI,
William Bondurant California FBI, special agent, LA division, three years
Tom Szot, FBI, special agent, 8 years, Chicago
Frank DePodesta, FBI special agent, Chicago (twice)
Joseph Thelen, retired FBI, 24 years, organized crime, NYC


First four tape exhibits - basically Kohring asking if he can do anything to help Veco or Bill Allen to let him know.

Ex#5 - brings up his nephew getting an internship with Veco, is told he needs to have a resume and Rick Smith tells him what needs to be on the resume and to get it in soon because, if I got it right, they are already filling these positions.

Ex#6 - RS and PK in room 604, RS briefly talks to VK on phone.
Kott: He hasn’t voted on a tax bill in 12 years, He hasn’t voted for a tax bill since he was born.
Smith: If he’s needed he said he’ll be there.

Ex#7 Voice Mail: Kohring: Left envelope with your name, contains my nephew’s resume you asked for and the Dittman poll on the oil industry and tax, you may already have it. Thanks for the nice dinner last night and in regards to my nephew, thank you very much.

Ex#8 Kohring telling Smith how he has pushed through an amendment that adds tax credits and says he thinks the oil companies won’t object because it means more money in their pockets and that he and Theresa worked three months to get this done


Ex#9 Kohring saying he’ll do whatever is needed to help out.

The FBI witnesses were verifying that the CD’s with the recordings are accurate copies of what is on the original audio and/or video, and that the transcripts are accurate reflections of the recordings too. This was fairly tedious as they had to repeat the same set of questions of each witness, each time they verified a specific tape.

Some return because the Prosecutors want to play the tapes in what appears to be chronological order. So they only verify one cd at a time.

In the previous two trials, one FBI agent was sufficient to verify all the tapes, but the defense attorney in pretrial motions would not accept that and insisted that the FBI agent who actually made the recording has to verify it. So we have agents being flown in from all over the US to do that tape by tape today.


John Henry Browne has been asking some of the agents if there is anything on the front of the materials that identifies who made the recording and basically, it appears, there isn’t. I guess he’s trying to raise doubts. Obviously there is is some way to connect the tape with the recorder, but the prosecutors haven’t followed up to clarify that.

Do Bloggers Count as Media?

For the first time since the press have been allowed to take computers into the courtroom, which began during the Kott trial, I was asked more than perfunctory questions today.

The guard took down the url of my blog and my telephone number. He let me in with the computer and said, we'll get back to you. There's no way I could have made this evening's long post without the computer. We'll see tomorrow if bloggers count.

Is John Henry Browne really Eddie Haskell 50 years later?

I finally figured it out. About 9:15 tonight the name Eddie Haskell bubbled up in my brain and I knew why. John Henry Browne. Actually, with Google's assistance, I discovered that Leave it To Beaver began on CBS on October 4, 1957, so this month is the fiftieth anniversary of the show. For those of you who didn't watch tv in the 50's and 60's, here's what Wikipedia says about Haskell:

Even today, the phrase "Eddie Haskell" is known to refer to an insincere brown-noser. . .He was known for his neat grooming—hiding his shallow and sneaky character. Typically, Eddie would greet his friends' parents with overdone, good manners and often a compliment such as, "That's a lovely dress you're wearing, Mrs. Cleaver."

It's the parts in italics that I was thinking of. I have ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to base any of the "shallow and sneaky character" parts of this description to Kohring's attorney. And after 50 years, I'm sure he's had time to work through all that.

Kohring Trial Day 2 - PM Opening Arguments

The prosecutor's witnesses weren't able to fly out of Juneau last night, but it probably didn't matter because the after the opening arguments and one witness - FBI Special Agent Dunphy - who testified how the wire taps are approved and run, it was about 4pm anyway.

First quick impression:

Both the prosecution and the defense made strong opening arguments. The prosecution said it was about abusing public trust. About Kohring getting money from Veco and then offering to help Veco in the legislature. He did a nice job of talking about the context - the gas pipeline, the ppt legislation, the importance of it all, the relationship between the Governor and the oil companies, etc. Well, after sitting through the Anderson and Kott cases, I got it; whether the jurors with much less background could follow it I'm not sure. It did seem pretty straightforward though. He also said the trial was unique because so much of the evidence was on tape - audio and video. It wasn't clear to me how much was actual taking money was on tape - at least one incident where Allen gave Kohring $1000 - and how much is going to rely on others - mainly Allen I guess - testifying that Kohring would say he wanted to do something (visit his family in Oregon, for example) but didn't have the money, and Allen would take out his wallet and peel off hundreds.

The defense began by saying it was an honor to try this case, something about participating in government. We get to vote and we get to be involved in cases like this with public officials. And that the jury should feel honored too.
Then basically he said his client was a decent man who didn't smoke, drink, or swear. But he was still good friends with Allen (who did all those things and Browne quoted him liberally to make the point) because Kohring has a Russian wife and step daughter and Allen then had a Russian girlfriend with a college age daughter.
Another key point was that Kohring had signed a no taxes pledge and would never have voted for the ppt bill because it was an increase in taxes. (If they changed it so it was called a fee he could have gone along.) He spent a fair amount of time trying to show that there were the sleazy, alcoholic, cussing bad guys and their legislative tools. "I own their asses" was quoted about everyone under the son including Don Young and Ted Stevens. He talked about how much money Ben Stevens got paid by Veco (he said $250,000 a year, but my recollection is that $200,000 was the total over a number of years. ) And how much Tom Anderson got paid, both for doing nothing. In comparison Kohring is so poor he lives in his office in Juneau and in a trailer in Wasilla and doesn't drink, smoke, swear, etc.

Clearly, hearing Kott and Anderson use profanity on the tapes and hearing them agree to the various deals made the prosecutors case much stronger. Browne is trying to distinguish his client as not one of those guys. We'll have to see what the prosecution has.

I've got a class tonight, so I don't have too much time here. I'll post my notes of the opening arguments below. NOTE: These are very rough. I did use spell checker to correct some of the worst. There is a lot missing - I just couldn't keep up. But it will give you a little flavor of the arguments. If the Daily News or APRN gets the days CD of the day from the Court today, maybe they'll have the audio available.

Prosecutor Joseph Bottini's Opening Argument

1:47pm

About misuse of public trust for personal gain. Using his office to ask for and accept things of value from people who needed his help.

Public official simply cannot use that office for their own personal financial gain. That is indeed what Mr. K. did. He accept things of value, in exchange for be ready willing and able to help people
Charged with conspiracy, bribery, extortion under color of official light, and attempted extortion.

In essence, charged with selling his public office, in exchange of using his position to help the people who gave him

Prove it through his own actions, his own words.

Central theme: Efforts to get natural gas pipeline built. Exxon, Conoco Philips, Fall 95 condition reached. Conditioned, - something had to take place before deal could happen. Producers wanted oil tax revamped. Wanted certainty for next several decades. Deal -tax rate 20% and fixed for number of years and offset by 20% credit for expenses.

Agreement had to be ratified by legislature. Key issue in 2006 legislative session Jan-May 2006. You will hear repeated refs. 20-20 agreement, Govt’s plan, as 20-20, or PPT, if you hear witnesses or recording using those words, that’s what they are talking about.

Also learn a lot about a company called Veco Corp. Basically an oil field services business - made most money providing services for oil production in AK. Veco’s bread and butter. Bill Allen CEO, basically started company in late 1960s and built it to 2005-06 Veco had 5000 employees world wide, back bone in AK.
Rick Smith, VP for govt. affairs for VECO. Both will testify as witnesses. Tell more in a minute.

Veco’s clients were primary oil producers - BP, Exxon, C-P who made the deal. Veco stood to make 100s of millions of $ from construction of pipeline. Before that could happen, this agreement had to be ratified and passed into law by the legislature. Bill A, RS and Veco were pushing hard in 2006 to get this passed. They pushed too hard, went over the line. The bribed a number of elected public officials. They both have pled guilty and they’ll tell you who they admitted paying bribes to. And that they have agreed to cooperate with the govt. what their expectations are with regard to their cooperation with the govt.

BA started getting active in politics about 20 years ago. Hiring a lobbyist. L = person who communicates info to legislators, tries to advance the ball for his clients. As years go on, Allen gets more active. Organizing fund raisers, Veco employees active with political contributions. Veco and Allen and Smith got in trouble. Veco started reimbursing employees for their political contributions. You can’t do that because corps can’t contribute to political campaigns.

They became so active, that they ended up very year going down to J. setting up shop. They rented suite 604 of the Baranof hotel. Use that as base of operations. Set up shop. You will hear a lot about their conduct in Suite 604.

Case is not about BA and RS. About VK

Elected first in 2006 entering 12th year in legislature. VK generally had a strong anti-tax philosophy. Also strongly in favor of oil industry. Allen and Smith became very supportive, of his campaigns, contributions to his campaign. They considered him a friend.

As 2006 leg. session kicked off, this critical piece of legislation was their primary focus. 20-20. They knew the vote was going to be close. Every vote counted. Every vote critical. Including Kohring’s. Despite the fact that he was generally supportive, they were concerned. He was such an anti-tax advocate, that he would think 20% too hight He might want lower tax.

Would be assigned to Special Committee on Oil and Gas. Kohring head of committee But bill going to Nat. Resources, not his committee. They knew Kohring was upset, that he was being bypassed. That’s why they decided to give him number of benefits. Gave VK cash, to keep VK loyal, that he would support the ppt bill as it went thru the legislature.

Like any trial, you’ll hear from a number of witnesses. Case unique in that bulk of evidence is real time recordings - audio and video - made during legislative session. Made under authority to do this. You’ll learn what govt. has to do to get permission to tape. Difficult to get these. Have to satisfy court that probably cause that criminal conversations will have to take place. Not done lightly. Even when authorized, still can’t listen to everything. Some kinds of conversations you can’t listen to.

Back in 2005 FBI sought authorization to put tap on RS’s cell phone. Then BA’s cell and then home phone. Jan. 2006 application for electronic surveillance in Suite 604 of the Baranof hotel.

From these wire taps and the bug, recorded a number of conversations, including between RS, BA, and VC. In some that we play for you, the language is pretty harsh. These two gentlemen - RS and BA particularly, were pretty profane

Pipeline contingent on 20-20 negotiation. RS and BA go down to J and set up shop in S. 604 in January FBI gets authorization to put a bug for audio and video in that suite.

PPT bill incorporated agreement - introduced to leg. on 2/21. Was not going to Kohring’s committee, but to Nat Resources. BA and RS concerned about VK’s feeling

They take K to island pub in Douglas AK, and gives VK $1000 in cash. Allen will tell you, not the first time he’s given K cash during legislature. He will tell you he gave K cash on 3 or 4 occasions. Always in K’s leg. office, only BA and VK their, $600-800, when K would tell Allen, “ I want to do something, but can’t afford it.” Allen would peel off the money and give it to him. Allen kept several thousand dollars in his wallet.

Reason he gave him the money - he felt sorry for Kohrning an his financial situation
But also because he knew he could keep K. loyal to him. 2002-6, same time he was giving K cash. Also asked K to do things for him, as a legislator, not as a private citizen.
2003, K introduced piece of leg. in house relating to royalties on CI oil platforms. A competing bill in the Senate. Upset that another leg. had highjacked his legislation. Referred to K’s committee. K. sits on bill in anger that someone else had hijacked his bill. He was asked by murkowski admin member, and BA asked him to release the bill and K did.

Also asked K on two occasions not to run against Lyda Green. Twice. Mr. K had announced his intention to run for the senate. He went to K twice and asked him not to run against Green. K. stayed in his house seat.

K hired a leg staffer who’d worked for a prior legislator. They filed a complaint against the legislator. BA angry about this because he liked legislator. BA called K and asked him to ?drop the complaint?

You will hear that these were just gifts between friends. Had nothing to do with his job as legislator. Listen to how these people act, what they say, how he brings up his problems, and how he promises to do things in return. It’s up to you to judge whether these are criminal activities.

2006 legislative session. Allen takes K out to dinner Feb 23 gives him $1000. March 3, Allen and Smith in 604, stressing out about passing ppt bill, this is our future, we gotta produce right now, profane, Smith: I know, we gotta get dirty, we gotta produce. BA: You know, just like the other night with old VK, you take off an I gave him a $1000. I know you did, thats why I left. And he will kiss our ass. They meant that they knew he would be behind them on this ppt legislation.

Another video March 20, 2006, Pete Kott another legislator with RS. You will hear RS’s end of conversation to meet VK in lobby in half hour. PK knows VK on phone. You know you aren’t going to hear VK on that bill. He hasn’t voted for a tax bill in 12 years. NO, no, we’ve talked to him. If you agree on the vote, I’ll vote for you. We’ve talked to him and he said he’d be there if we needed him to be there.

Mr. K ]’s nephew got a job with Veco. BA and RS will tell you how this came up. VK asked if his nephew can get a job there. You’ll hear on the phone. Getting his nephew’s resume. “Thanks for the good things you do for me.” I’ve dropped off my nephew’s resume. Call if I can do anything to help. Let me know what I can do. Can I lobby on your behalf? Keep in mind ppt bill in legislator.

Another call. I stand by ready to help.

March 29 VK calls RS I want to talk to you and BA. Serious matter for me. RS and BA agree to meet. Video March 30, 2006 - VK comes up, sits down. I’m in trouble with personal finances. $17,000 on credit card agency, they’re ready to sue, will hurt me politically. You guys got any ideas? They talk about possibility of cosigning on loan to get him out. Maybe hire him at VEco. As they talk about this. They also say they have to be discreet. CAn’t let people know they are helping K financially. K: I won’t do anything that will raise red flags. Then K brings up his desire to visit family over easter break. BA says I like to put $ in plastic easter eggs and go find them. BA asks RS for $100s. BA gives to VK. VK says thanks. I just sent my step daughter money for a gscout uniform. BA hands a stack of currency to VK “let me help you out.” K: what can I do at this point to help you guys? Just keep lobbying my colleagues for the governor’s plan. Talk about specific legislators he was close to he could lobby. He provides inside info on where dif. legs are on their support for ppt.

Next day phone call: Want to let you guys know I’m doing what I can to help you out. I’m scheduling appointments. I’ll keep lobbying the best I can.” This is the day after they gave him lots of cash.

Reg. session ran to May 10. PPT didn’t pass. Conversation between RS and BA on May 8. If this goes thru, we’re going to have to take care of a number of people, BW, Ben Stevens, VK - got to figure out what to do with him. Regular session ends w/o ppt. Murkowski calls a special session to continue to consider ppt leg. Toward the end of this 1st spec. session. PPT bill jacked around and comes out at 22.8%. Concerned that the producers will walk away at tax that high. So now they want to kill the bill. On June 8, late in the evening, BA comes up with plan to mess this up.

Plan: If i can get VK away from the capital so he isn’t available, it’s going to die because every member is supposed to be there. Mr. Allen’s end of the conversation. How about you and I go for a ride. Why not just don’t show up. PK and RS say that won’t work. They’ll figure out what’s going on and call for a vote. All you’re going to do is hurt VK and you’ll get into trouble.

Can’t reach K. BA goes to McDonalds and meets VK. On way back to hotel. He pulls out $5-600 out of his pocket and sticks into VKs hands. BAck to 604 talking about how plan wouldn’t work, Allen turns to VK and says, “I wouldn’t done it to you.” VK says, ”I would have done it for you anyway Bill.”

Aug. agents went to Wasilla and interviewed him. Asked if he ever received any money from BA or RS for personal use and campaign expenses. When they asked him to elaborate, VK said, I’d like to reflect on that. Later he says, I only received personal gifts, the value was in hundreds of $ and he didn't keep track. Had asked for help on the $17K credit card debt. The only time I ever took cash was that one time in the suite. It was about $100 bucks or so.

As you listen to evidence in trial. Keep an open mind. Render a true and just verdict in this case. You will find him guilty of receiving benefits in return do favors for those supporting him.

2:31 Break

2:43

Defense Attorney John Henry Browne's Opening Argument

Thank you. I’m honored to be able to participate. It’s an honor for me and you also. Want to thank you for your attention. Interesting that you aren’t taking notes for opening. That makes sense. What we say is not evidence. I’m going to tell you in context, what I think this case will present to you. Top of jigsaw puzzle. I think this is what is going to look like. But it may not. This is not supposed to be an argument. Just supposed to give you an overview of what I think the jigsaw puzzle looks like.

A little out of context, response to what Botinni said. ONe important thing - evidence will show that there are many legal ways to make political contributions to candidates. One example - Haliburton company donated to Bush and Bush listened to Haliburton company. But that is all legal. As long as you declare. People who contribute to your campaign are people you will want to listen to. Not a lot, but about 8% of the money for his campaign where he was elected 7 times with over 60% of the vote. 8% or less. Still a lot of money. Veco was a contributor to VK like Haliburton contributed to Bush and Environmental Defense fund contributes to Democrats. That’s how it is done and is legal.

Talk about fundraisers will be legal fundraisers. Mr. Allen, I will warn you, i will use some of the language. Allen thought he owned the world. He made comments like “I owned so and so’s ass.” They drank a lot. My client doesn’t drink, doesn’t swear. He says I own politicians’ asses. He includes Don Young and Ted Stevens. I own them. He donated lots of money legitimately to a lot of political campaigns. Responding to what Botinni said. This huge bill very important, economy going down a bit because oil production going down. Lots of people saying we need a pipeline, from all poltiical groups. REason bill didn’t go to Vic’s committee, which it normally would have done, was because BA, RS, Ben STevens didn’t trust Vic Kohring. That group, people’s whose asses were owned by BA, didn’t want it to go to VK’s committee. When PK said to Allen and Smith said, you will never get VK to vote for ppt, he had never voted for a tax in his whole career. PK is laughing at them. Ar you crazy? In one vote, VK was the only legislator in house or senate to vote for ppt. They knew they couldn't send the bill to his committee. He’d signed the American taxpayer’s pledge. Pledge never to vote to increase taxes. People who believe that believe enough money generated thru taxes to take care of things, and if you trim back bureaucracy and $150K executives, you can run the state fine. VK has signed this pledge and lived by it his whole career. I don’t know that the government knew this until recently.

VK never voted for any ppt legislation every. If the object is to get the legislation passed. Important for you to know that VK never voted for it. Ever. They knew he’d never vote for the tax. They knew they had to do everything they could. I ‘ll read it to you: “Don’t use this opportunity to go whacko on us” VK reminds them: That is is position that is his philosophy.

During presentation you just heard, VK never voted for ppt. New info, I never heard it before of any meeting at McDonalds or any effort to get VK to kill bill. Let’s see if they can prove that. I never heard it before.

This intern, did something very symbolic of the integrity of this case. I like that word - integrity - based on several things that never happened. Let me talk to you about the Easter egg. VEry symbolic.

BA felt sorry for Bill. BA cultivated friendship. VK felt a friend of BA. Even though very different life styles - VK doesn’t drink, smoke. Talking about easter, BA, whose been drinking. YOu know what I do with my kids, get little plastic eggs, put money in them and hide them. VK loves his daughter. BA actually talked to VK’s daughter, whose Russian. Mr. K’s wife is russian and step daughter’s is russian. BA’s girlfriend at the time was Russian and her daughter too. Here’s some money. BA will tell you he felt tremendous sadness for VK because VK lives within his means. BA is a multi multi millionaire - at least $100 million. VK sleeps in his office in Juneau. in Wasilla lives in a trailer. BA concerned VK didn’t have enough money to eat.

BA says, here, take some money, put them in the easter eggs. What B. left out of the conversation, VK says thanks a lot. I got the money to go home, we went to church we had an incredible time because I put all the money you gave me into the easter eggs.

If they can be characterized as gifts, there can be no crime there. Another 15 or 20 minutes]

At some point during conversations with BA and RS, um, VK tells them, often, I can’t vote for ppt I can’t vote for any tax. If you want to restructure this legislation, and he believed it was good for AK, and turn it into a fee and not a tax, then it would be something I could support. He tells them that.

Govt. says sometime in 2003, allegation made in last two weeks, Mr. K did something to release a bill from his committee because BA told him too. I believe not evidence to support that, except for BA. In addition to alcohol problems BA had, he had a very serious motorcycle accident without a helmet, BA this millionaire who uses fuck, shit asshole in every sentence. It is his testimony alone that says this.

BA will tell you he made a deal with the govt. to save his children from being prosecuted. Is there anything we love more than our children? BA made a deal with the govt - the G really owns his ass. If he satisfies them he probably won’t go to prison as long as he expects and his children won’t be indicted. And Veco as a corp will not be charged as a defendant. Corps can be charged as defendant. Part of the deal was that VECO would not be charged. Then Veco would be worthless. Who would buy Veco if it was under fed indictment. In addition to the 50-80 million he made from sale of Veco - he was allowed to keep $500,000 to pay for his attorneys. This personally makes me feel really bad. You’re going to plead guilty, make a deal with the govt. your kids not charged, the corp not charged, and you’re going to spend $500K to plead guilty.

BA and RS made a great deal, and this is what you will hear. You’ll hear about people who will kiss their asses, They own, I already told you. Ben STevens Ted Stevens, Pete Kott, and once they threw in Kohring’s name. Ben Stevens had a consulting contract with Veco that gained BS $250,000 a year while he was a legislator.

The money they are talking about giving this guy is less than $3000. They are bragging about people they own. They paid BS $250k/year. They owned Kott because he inflated the bill, he made $10K more graft money to do what BA told him to do. They did vote for ppt. They did take a lot of action for ppt. They did a lot for their $250K. Mr. Anderson also had a contracting job for Veco. Not required to do anything BA will tell you and BS didn’t have to do anything. And they’re giving money to VK for easter eggs.

I don’t know what to say about this allegation bout trying to kill the bill. We’ll see what they say.

He’s known as gentle giant, few people taller than me, he’s one. He’d stay in his office til 2am where he slept because he couldn’t afford a home. He would always return every constituents phone call. When not working in legislature. He’s a sheet rocker. He doesn’t live in a multi-millionaire. He’s a sheet rocker and refuses to be bought. Somewhat controversial because of his no tax pledge. He’s never violated in the seven times he was elected. He will explain to you why. He things taxing corps and individuals hurts economy in the long run. If you really don’t want to hurt the economy you don’t tax individuals too much or corps more than already.

Met ba because of the russian women in their lives and their children. Did legal fundraisers - you’ll hear of APOC - keep in mind only 8% of his campaign money about $80K - came from Veco.

What’s important about, BS made all this money and Anderson made all this money from Veco and Kott also and promised job from Veco, what’s important, they all voted for ppt. Which Botinni admits is what Veco wanted to do. Mr. K never did.

Mr. K would from time to time in his recordings say, “i’ll help you guys try to get this point across. It was the gov’s bill. You understand, I didn’t , these bill oil companies wouldn’t make any investments in the pipeline unless they had certainty thru this ppt bill which VK always voted against. In these tape, if you don’t take them out of context, you’ll know what was said. He says, You know my philosophy you know I can’t vote for this, but I’ll help you get your point across. BP, Conoco, whats the other one? would invest without being taxed. Believed pipeline good for AK.

Checking his notes.

Let’s talk about what was actually said. You heard something about mr.K firing one of his aides because BA told him to Eric Musser, you’ll see from emails, he left, not fired, the emails themselves say, VK wants him to come back to work. But the Govt.s argument is that he was fired, at will employee. Mr. Musser was ragging off some really good friend of ba there were phone calls. VK didn’t know about the complaint. I don’t know if Musser will be awitness or not.

How much time your honor? about 7 min.

Tom Anderson, had a contract with Veco to do nothing
Pete Kott, speaker of the house at one point, inflated one of his invoices, made $10,000 or more.
BW, don't want to talk about him, his case is on hold, you’ll hear about his son in this trial. FBI, BEn stevens, John Cowdery, Bev Masek, Don Young Ted Stevens. With these huge names, and then you have VK on his couch in his trailer.
[He did the next part really fast, and this isn’t even close, but the best I could do. I’m guessing one point was to show the profanity these people used and how they bragged about owning all these politicians.]
Direct quote: conversation between Smith and Allen: March 6. They have all this stuff.
S: Well you will always coer my ass
BA; you too
S: Thank you cuz, I told that little gal, whose all fucked up,
BA: Which one?
S: Theres’ som any of them
BA How many times have we gotten out of spots
S: Oh Jesus
BA O Shit, even before with old Jerry Ward. That was all horseshit
S: We got PK
BA And on and on
What about Rick Halford, we owned him
S: The list goes on and on
But we’re still here, absolutely
S; I don’t have a prob.
A: We know what the gov wants. And we got Ted. And we got DY?

Who’s name is not mentioned in that diatribe? VK.
Go on about who they own. Kott. Anderson, Give them a fake contract.
Anderson asking about getting $ for doing nothing. Lots of money. Anderson is worried about this. Don’t sorry. Is Ben stevens worried about this shit? Hell no. Then why should Anderson be worried.

These are the guys who got bribed, not VK
Keep in mind all of them voted for and lobbied for Veco and ppt. He did not.

Then discussions about how VK told them time and time again, he would not vote for it because it was a tax. How he wanted to borrow, went to BA because V thought he was a friend. That went no where because they knew he wouldn’t vote for them.

OK my time’s up, you’ve been paying close attention. VK’s life changed completely when he borrowed BA’s truck. Tells FBI complete truth in 2.5 interview, could be charged with perjury if he lied. Wasn’t charged. They took 30,000 documents and didn’t find anything.

Please, please keep an open mind. This is really important.

Kohring Trial Day 2 - Jury Selected

The street was white when I got the paper this morning. When I read Lisa Demer's article, I realized that the jury selection got further along yesterday afternoon than I expected. I debated whether to drive or get another bike trip in before the trails are too icy. So I didn't get to court until 10:50am.

By my quick count the jury had seven men and five women. The alternates were two men and a woman. Very different composition from the previous trials.

This was supposed to go up at lunch. Don't know why it didn't.

Mark Twain's "The War Prayer"

There was a reading at Cyrano's tonight of Mark Twain's The War Prayer. It's very short and you can read it at the link. The program cites Kevin Drum,

"His family begged him not to publish it, his friends advised him to bury it, and his publisher rejected it, thinking it too inflammatory for the times. Twain agreed, but instructed that it be published after his death, saying famously: "None but the dead are permitted to tell the truth.

After the reading there was a discussion featuring representatives of Buddhism, Islam, Judaism, and Christianity sponsored by the Interfaith Council. The question was "How can God be on Everyone's Side?"

The comment that was most enlightening to me was from Rev Koun Franz in response to what a good Buddhist would do if he saw someone violently assaulting another. It would be ok to intervene, he said, if you did it for the right reason, which would be to help both people. If you intervened from moral superiority to punish the aggressor you would cause a short term benefit, but you would be perpetuating what the aggressor was doing. This helps me understand a story I heard the other day about a survivor of the Mi Lai massacre during the Vietnam war. Asked today what she thought about Americans coming to Mi Lai today, she said she was glad they came. What if it was one of the people who killed her family? That would be even better, because then I could forgive them.

How different is that way of thinking about the world from an eye for an eye.

Kohring Trial Day 1 - Jury Selection and the Defense Attorney

9:00 AM

3:07-CR-00055-JWS

Judge Sedwick

Anchorage Courtroom 3

USA vs. VICTOR H. KOHRING
TRIAL BY JURY - DAY 1

Today was devoted to jury selection. Judge Sedwick used the same process he used in the Kott and Anderson trials. The first part already happened - the elimination of potential jurists based on their questionnaires. From what I understand, those who expressed bias about the case there, have been eliminated. When I walked into court today, about 9:15 am, the gallery was packed by people with little blue stickers on their chests that said "Juror."

I missed the first part, but I imagine it was the same as the Kott trial - jurors were introduced to the various parties, told the charges, given instructions about their job and restrictions about talking to others or viewing news about the case. Another court observer told me that one of the potential witnesses, Fred James, was given permission to be in the courtroom for the jury selection process. He's one of the two writers of the USA v. Victor H. Kohring blog I mentioned yesterday. What I hadn't realized was that the two writers have different views on the defendant and the blog will reflect this. James, I was told, is a long time, good friend of Kohring's.

Anyway, the jury was sent out and then they were brought back in, one-at-a-time to answer questions about their awareness of the case, the people involved in the case, and whether they could be fair and unbiased. The basic questions the judge asked were:
1. Where do you get your news?
2. Do you remember anything from the news about Kohring or Veco, Bill Allen, Rick Smith?
If they did, then
3. What do you know, have you formed an opinion, could you give a fair hearing. One question he asked along these lines to one or two jurors was, "If you were the defendant, would you want someone like you on the jury?"

Most of the jurors said they don't pay much attention to politics and don't know much or anything about the case. My sense this time round - I stayed for the first 29 jurors and the lunch break - was that even when they said they knew nothing, they tended not to be as oblivious as that suggested. When pressed they often knew something

Two jurors, while I was there, were dismissed. One because she had a back problem and sitting for long times caused her pain. Another, a full time student who works full time hadn't asked to be dismissed. The judge asked if this would affect his studies. He said he'd miss some midterms. The judge asked why he hadn't asked to get out. "Several people told me it wouldn't do any good." The judge said, "Well this court is a little friendlier. A two day trial would be ok, but a two week trial would really affect your studies. I'm going to excuse you."

One juror met Rick Smith, a likely witness, smoking outside Reilly's Bar several times. Another juror who works at Cal Worthington Ford, met Bill Allen there. A third juror had been at meetings of his Community Council when Vic Kohring attended. Alaska is a small place.

Jury Composition

The jury looked different from the Anderson and Kott jury pools. The most striking difference was the relative balance of genders. The Kott trial ended up with ten women and two men. But today, in the first 29 jurors questioned, 15 were men, 14 were women. There were two African Americans, a person from Bethel and one from Unalaska, if I understood right. The ages of the jurors seemed more evenly distributed than the prior two jurors - the Anderson jury being particularly young looking. And there was even one gentleman who had on a tie!

John Henry Browne

For me the big unknown was the defense attorney. When I walked in, I saw him from behind and thought he was younger until he turned and faced the gallery. He was wearing what looked like an expensive light grey suit with just a touch of green. His shirt was just barely pink. The prosecutors, in comparison, were in dark, dark grey to black suits with white shirts, except for Mr. Goeke who had a beige shirt. Even Agent Mary Beth Kepner [Thanks, Steve, I was getting tired when I did that] had on a grey suit. And Mr. Browne's hair also looked expensive - basically brown with what would have been called surfer blond streaks where I grew up near Venice Beach. OK, I know what some of you are thinking. But this is not intended as a fashion evaluation of the attorneys. I do think, however, that the dress does tell us something about people. Browne very definitely pays attention to how he looks. He also has trouble talking without moving. If his arms aren't moving, or his hands, then his fingers are moving. A few times I could even see the muscles in his back moving through his jacket. And this was just very low key questions to the jury.

His voice is radio quality deep and his intonation is precise, more articulated than most American speakers naturally talk. Perhaps he's done some acting or had other voice coaching.

When he asked questions of the jurors, or even when he didn't, he would say, "Good morning" in the same exact tone which sounded warm and interested the first time, but after hearing it repeated precisely many times, it began to sound canned. For two jurors, he said something like, "Your comments were much more extensive than the other jurors" which I thought sounded like calculated flattery, and which caused Prosecutor Botinni to object to the "unnecessary editorial comments" about juror performance. The judge concurred.

He also addressed the court twice, between jurors, with two questions that I thought seemed inappropriate. The first time he wanted to know about jurors who came from outside of Anchorage - who paid for them? (The court pays their airfare and hotel, but they don't go back for weekends the judge replied.) The second question was whether the jurors came from all of Alaska. The judge explained that they only came from the Anchorage district, which was a large district, stretching from Cordova to the Aleutians. It just seemed to me that these were curiosity items, that I would have written down and checked on later. Or, as the Outside defense attorney, I would have found out before the trial. And being an Outside attorney - the local attorney Wayne Anthony Ross was not there today - he wouldn't understand the implications of what local talk show hosts the jurors said they listened to.

Overall, his behavior reinforced the impression I've gotten in the pretrial press coverage. This is the Seattle attorney who is coming to the boondocks to try a case. If that really is the way he's thinking, I suspect he's in for a big surprise. Judge Sedwick has run very tight, but fair, trials. His excusing of the full time student today is an example of his practical understanding of what makes sense and what doesn't. The prosecution has done an overwhelming amount of work and have been extremely well prepared. The teams at the previous two trials were one local attorney and one from the DC based Public Integrity Section. These guys do their homework. The pairing for this trial is Joe Botinni, whose been in the Anchorage US Attorney Office for many years, and Edward P. Sullivan from DC. On the other hand, it does seem that the taped evidence is likely to be not as damaging as in the other cases, and that Kohring might appear to have been less calculating than Kott or Anderson in working out ways to get paid. We will see.

Chicago Today - Circa 1935

We've got an extra bedroom downstairs that is essentially a store room that needs to be sorted out. Going through some of my father's old stuff, I came across this soft cover guide to Chicago, that I'm guessing was published in 1936. For a booklet entitled "Chicago Today" you'd think somewhere it would have a date. I've copied the pages here in high resolution so you can double click to enlarge them and see how good the photos are. This is just a few of the 65 or so pages. (No page numbers either.)




Edward Kelly was mayor of Chicago from 1933 to 1947 according to the Chicago public library So that doesn't narrow the date down much - 1933 at the earliest.



But here it says "Chicago -one hundred and three years ago was a 'mud hole trading post.'" And further down the page it says "In the spring of 1833 Chicago was incorporated and numbered at that time 550 people." So I'm calculating 1833 + 103 years = 1936. I see I should have left all the pages the original color. I changed some to black and white thinking a) the pages were black and white (which you can see they really aren't) and b) you would be able to read them better (which you can if you click on them.) It also says, "...and destined to become the world's largest city by 1968."

State and Madison Streets

Lake Shore Drive from the Drake Hotel and Michigan Boulevard from Chicago Ave

Skyline showing Grant Park and Michigan Boulevard

Aviation - "Daily 110 planes arrive and depart bearing some 500 passengers. During 1934 - 40,226 planes arrived and 40,266 planes took off." Ok, this also means we are after 1934 and where did the 40 extra planes that took off come from anyway? And that means an average of 5 passengers per plane!

Famous Restaurants. I'm not a Chicago boy so I don't know what's still around, if anything.

Baseball - Wriggly Field and Comiskey Field

Chicago Leads and Interesting Facts - Among the facts are more clues about the date of the book. "January 1935 brought 6,231 buyers to the Furniture Mart..." This was the latest date I could find, also suggesting the book was published in 1936.


Well, it was chartered in 1833 and incorporated in 1837. So I'm sticking with 1936 as the date of publication for now. But someone looking closer might find a later automobile or some other reference that could put it later.

Michael Clayton

I walked out of Michael Clayton feeling like I'd been to a good restaurant but the food just wasn't satisfying. This is Erin Brockavich from the viewpoint of one of the attorneys trying to screw over the class action victims. But there wasn't any soul. Listening to real life corrupt business men this summer in the US District court telling their stories maybe makes this story seem thin.





I'm not sure why the video quality of the clips is so bad. As usual, this is not a spoiler, but gives you a sense of the film if you don't pay attention to the subtitles.

New Blog to Cover Kohring Trial

Philip Munger and Fred James have set up a new blog USA vs Victor H. Kohring. They are two Valley residents so they have a particular interest in their representative's trail. They have a long list of links to trial related websites. Here's what they say about themselves:

Philip Munger: I've been involved in Alaska politics since 1973, and have been on a first-name basis with all my legislators, local, state and national ever since. I've worked at sea, in law enforcement and public safety, and have been a college music teacher since 1995. I'm mostly known in Alaska as a composer. My politics tend to the left, most notably on environmental and social justice issues. My community activism finds me on the board of Friends of Mat-Su, a local body concerned with zoning and quality-of-life issues in the Matanuska-Susitna Borough. I'm a Democrat, and am currently volunteering as the Issues Coordinator for the Diane Benson for U.S. Congress campaign. I live near Palmer, Alaska.

Fred James:

Fred won't be able to attend the first part of the trial, as he may be called as a witness for the defense, and Judge Sedgewick has ruled such potential witnesses are barred from the courtroom until they testify. But he isn't gagged or barred from commenting on whatever he finds out through other means.

Hijacked Linksys Routers

I've spent way too much time in the last two days trying to get my Linksys router sorted out. My son had given it to us a while ago. When I got my MacBook I finally got the wireless working and my wife's computer could still get internet too.
MAC ID
Key Points:

If the Linksys router is simply set up without changing the name and without password protection, it appears that only one Linksys label shows up when you look to connect, even if there are several. Unless you change it like some of my neighbors have to Linksysa and Linksys71.

So, I got on someone else's Linksys connection, changed the name, put on a password. It was only when I wanted to change things that my friend Jeremy pointed out that I wasn't connected to my own router. You can check the MAC ID ((media access control identification card) on the bottom of the router. In Airport, if you click on "Open Internet Connect" at the bottom of the list of connections above you get this next window. The base station ID appears to be the MAC ID.















Killer Tip to Free Your hijacked Router: If someone seems to have hijacked your Linksys router - as I inadvertently did to one of my neighbors - you can reset your router back to the default settings. There's a little hole in the back of the Linksys router. If you push the button in the hole in back (see red arrow in picture of router) for 30 seconds, with a pen point or paper clip, then still holding it, unplug the power for 30 seconds, then still holding it, plug the power back in for 30 more seconds. Those were the instructions I got from the guy on the phone from Bangalore and it worked. The router was liberated, it went back to default settings. By the way, once I figured this all out, with much help, I did go back and liberated my neighbor's router and set it back to the original settings.



So, thanks Jeremy. I owe you big time.

I keep telling myself that all these things one has to learn are good for your brain. If it's true, my brain is in great really fit.

[I've noticed a few people googling to here and realized the instructions had been cut off so I've added them back in. 11/13/07]

Will Putting Individuals in Prison Change the System?

I'm still sorting through my thoughts on the corruption trials. I did talk to Rep. Sharon Cissna about it a couple of weeks ago. I asked her the question I'd like to ask all our legislators - "You must have known something was going on. Why didn't you do something about it? Ethan Berkowitz did, but what about the rest of you?"

She said that she and other Democrats did do things. They worked hard to keep the worst stuff out of various bills. But they were pretty much cut out of things. The Republican caucus would go off and meet and make all their decisions privately and the Dems would sit in the chambers because the Republicans would come suddenly and call for a vote. At the ending weeks of the session things work quickly and if the Minority are not right there, they lose what small power they have.

She said that there were many times when they spoke up and she even sent me a list of times to look up on the audio recordings of the session. But my Mac couldn't read what she'd sent and I got distracted. My fault. But rather than hold off, I decided to put this up now, especially after reading Saturday's ADN editorial about Tom Anderson's sentence.

Convicted former legislator Tom Anderson was a relatively small fish in Alaska's corruption scandal. He didn't deserve the harshest possible prison sentence. But his post-conviction display of contrition, and the long roster of support letters he produced, didn't justify the shortest possible sentence, either.

Given the range of prison time Anderson faced, federal Judge John Sedwick's sentence of five years is about right. It sends a strong message that those who get caught violating the public trust are going to pay a serious personal price.

Rep. Cissna's comment was that the system itself is the major problem. When she arrived, if I remember her right, her husband had just recently died. She showed up in Juneau and was surrounded by lobbyists fawning all over her. But given her husband recent death, she rejected their efforts to give her attention. The lobbyists very quickly left her alone. Besides, she was a Democrat without much power anyway.

But, she said, anyone who came to Juneau with ego issues was an easy target for the lobbyists. And with most people living away from home and often without their families, they didn't go back to their families at night, but rather were out for dinner and then the bars, often with lobbyists right there to pick up the tab.

She even commented on the ethics training that was mandatory for all legislators last January. What surprised her was how the workshop caused her to realize how she herself had been affected by the Juneau atmosphere. She heard grumbling made by some around her and comparing it to the ethics expert thought, "Yeah, I knew that was wrong, but I've been here long enough that my own standards of right and wrong have been blurred." She said other legislators felt that the consultant didn't really understand how things worked. (Michael Josephson specializes in state legislative ethics having studied the issue throughout the US, and he charged around $30,000 for the one day workshop.)

So I think the ADN is right. Tom Anderson was a small fish. We know that he wasn't even a target at first. But Bobrick and Prewitt, who had agreed to cooperate with the Prosecution in order to lessen their own sentences snagged him. Mind you, Anderson had had consulting stints with Veco where he got paid for not doing much at all, and at the Alaska Telephone Association where he was paid to read legislation about rural telephone service and do analysis on it, but had no work product at the end. Even his own attorney on the final day said that Tom Anderson really shouldn't have been a legislator - he needed money and the pay of a legislator wasn't going to meet those needs.

So, Tom Anderson will go to jail. Will that make a difference? Sure, in the short run people will be careful. But it won't last long if the system stays the same. Apparently the main part of the new ethics law that is having any effect is the limit of $15 meals someone can spend on a legislator.

And without the massive investigation including the video recording for nearly six months at the Baranof Hotel and the tens of thousands of phone calls monitored, there would be precious little evidence and we would probably know nothing.

The trials have revealed a lot and as I sort it out in my own head I'll post more.

Thoughts on the Alaska Political Corruption Trials - Part I Conflicts of Interest, Undue Gain, and Improper Influence

Most people who talk about ethics tell us that public officials and administrators must avoid ‘conflicts of interest.” This is the standard mantra. I’d argue that they CAN”T avoid such conflicts. They are built into being human. There is always the potential for a conflict between our personal and professional obligations. The key is what we do about the conflict. The main potential problems stemming from conflicts of interest are:

• Undue Gain
• Improper Influence

Undue gain is perhaps easier to understand if we talk about due gain first. This is what a public administrator or elected official receives in compensation for completing the job duties in the manner set out by contract, policy, law, etc. Generally it includes monetary payment (salary, per diem, etc.), benefits (health insurance, specified leave time, etc.), and possible benefits related to the job (minor use of a copier, tuition waiver for university employees, for example). Anything beyond that is UNDUE gain - extra payments or gifts to do the job one is already being paid for, special treatment of services (free tickets, meals, etc.)

Improper Influence is also easier to understand if we talk about proper influence. Normally, when an administrator makes a decision it is based on some set of decision rules. These could be specific criteria to get, say, a building permit. They could be based on a standard or procedure established for hiring new employees. There are also more general policies and procedures for how to spend money, and rules to prevent unlawful discrimination and privacy violations. Or they could be professional standards (for engineers, attorneys, or nurses, for example) or even unwritten, but known customary procedure. As you go higher up the organization, the decisions are less concerned with individual cases and more with general policy. Policy often takes one into unknown territory and there may not be specific guidelines on how to make decisions. But there will be procedural rules that, ideally, are intended to make the process open and fair. And there are basic management standards and techniques for anticipating and evaluating things like costs and benefits. Improper influence is when you take into considerations factors that are not in the sanctioned decision making criteria, such as whether taking a certain action will benefit oneself and/or one’s friends.

So if we look at the Anderson and Kott cases, we see in the bribery and extortion convictions, that they had undue gain - money and other benefits to do what they were already being paid for by their legislative salaries and per diem. There was also improper influence. The decisions they made were colored with more than the public interest and objective analysis of the issues; they also considered what their benefactors wanted them to do. And while both Kott and Anderson argued that these were decisions they would have made anyway, since they were consistent with their ideology, it is clear that they might not have pursued their positions with such zeal, and that they might have spent more time on other issues their constituents needed.

But it isn’t simply black and white. If a contractor who wants to do business with a government agency leaves a pen with the company’s name on it after a meeting, is that undue gain? If a law firm that does business with the Municipality of Anchorage sends a fruit basket to the Legal Department in December, is that going to lead to improper influence?

Here’s where we see how conflict of interest is a basic tension embedded in our culture (and most others.) Our personal lives are ruled by values of loyalty. Family and friends take priority over strangers. We give gifts and do favors that we freely exchange with people close to us. But when we go into public office, we are expected to make decisions based on the rule of law, on equal treatment to all (rich or poor, stranger or friend). So when people from our personal lives are also involved in our professional lives we have two different standards in conflict. But even strangers we come to know through our jobs should be treated politely and with respect - as people, not as objects. There are human decencies - exchanging pleasantries and doing minor favors - that we do naturally for people we come to know.

Those with an interest in specific governmental decisions take advantage of these impulses to be friendly and helpful. There was a great deal of testimony that Tom Anderson was a naturally friendly guy, eager to help out, to please. Lots of examples. His defense attorney argued that was all he was doing for Prewitt and Bobrick. Other legislators have told me, "I can't be bought for a $10 lunch." In fact they sound like they have been personally insulted when such actions are criticized. "I have to eat. This gives me a chance to talk to my constituents while I'm eating. I'm actually giving up my time." But if we stand back and look at it in terms of improper influence and undue gain, that answer doesn't hold up. If you have to eat, why not pay for your own lunch? Just say, "Fine, let's have lunch, but I pay my own way." If they pressure you or ridicule you, they are really testing your resolve and willingness to play ball. Even if the cost of the lunch doesn't have an effect on your action, the 90 minutes of private time to tell their side of the story, to give you their facts, in private, without someone with a different view their to challenge the accuracy of their facts may well influence your vote.

Of course my argument flies in the face of what's practical. Legislators must listen to constituents, usually in private. They also listen to proponents and opponents of various legislation well before the topic comes up in on the official public chamber. But these one sided conversations mean that legislators often only hear one side of an issue. One way to counter this is to have legislators imply publicly post their work calendars so all people can see how much time they've spent talking with whom. More work? Not too much. They pretty much have to keep a calendar anyway, and logging phone calls is good business practice, and caller id makes this easier to do. Perhaps no one would even look at the information. But at least it should be discussed with an open mind.

The point is to to have legislators themselves question business as usual, to look critically at "how we've always done it" against the dangers of undue gain and improper influence.


I'm going to try to write a series of posts looking at issues relating to understanding corruption using what has come out in the political corruption trials in Alaska. The theoretical framework is based on: Steven E. Aufrecht, “Balancing Tensions Between Personal and Public Obligations: Context for Public Ethics and Corruption” in Dwivedi, O.P. and J. Jabbra (2007) Public Administration In Transition: A Fifty-Year Trajectory Worldwide, Vallentine Mitchell Publishers

Chinese Blocks on Blogspot Gone?

I've started getting hits from China again in the last week or two. Does this mean that the blocks on blogspot in China are gone? I know that some Chinese bloggers had used proxy sites to get around the blocks. But I've had several know that came directly from China. This would be a very welcome change.


[It's late and I posted the above without even trying to see if there was anything official. And there is some confirmation:

China Blocks YouTube, Restores Flickr and Blogspot

China's Web viewers can no longer access YouTube, but Blogspot.com and Flickr photos are now available.

Steven Schwankert, IDG News Service

Thursday, October 18, 2007 8:00 AM PDT

Please Wait...

China watchers, get your scorecards out: Google Inc.'s YouTube is blocked, Wikipedia is still blocked, but, for the moment, Google blog site Blogspot.com is available and some pictures from Yahoo Inc.'s Flickr photos can once again be viewed.

China-based users accessing YouTube since Wednesday afternoon began receiving the dreaded "The server at www.youtube.com is taking too long to respond," the typical response when a user attempts to view a site that has been blocked.

Google's blog site, Blogspot, is currently available after being blocked in June. An unblocking of the site last year led to the availability of a Shanghai-based foreign blogger known as Chinabounder, whose blog recounted the author's sexual exploits with Chinese women while working as an English teacher. The posts ultimately led to an unsuccessful hunt for the author and a temporary closing of the blog. Google did not respond to a request for comment on YouTube's block and Blogspot's availability.

For the rest, go to PC World.]

Before You Set Up A Blogspot Blog

I had a meeting yesterday with Steve Cleary at AkPirg - the Alaska Public Interest Research Group. We've met each other and had brief conversations over the last couple of years but we've never sat down and talked. He had contacted me about something I'd posted, plus he'd spent seven weeks in India this year. We'd talked briefly before he left and I hadn't talked to him about his trip yet. So we did talk about those things, but we ended up talking about blogging a lot. He's ready to start his own blog. I've had this one since July 2006, and I've only had a few posts about what I've learned, so here's a little bit.

Anyway if you want to start a blog, I think Blogspot (like this one, part of Google's Blogger) is the best way to go for someone who isn't too computer savvy. The other two big blog sites - Wordpress and Typepad - seem to require a little more work under the hood. Ropi just switched from Blogspot to a Typepad blog, so he may have some thoughts on this. (hmmmm. I just went to his blog to get the url and it looks like he's back on Blogspot. Do you want to tell us why Ropi?) [Ropi's comment below finally jarred my memory. It was Joshua Lim in Malaysia who went to Wordpress. Maybe he'll tell us about the benefits and pitfalls.] Anyway, if you want to just jump in and play with a blog, just to see what this is all about, Blogspot is really, really easy. Really. But I would recommend you do the following first:

1. Pick a name you like and go to Google blog search to see if someone already has the name.
2. Pick a url - a www..... address
3. Figure out what sort of template you want

More detail on each below.

1. The actual name - in my case "What Do I Know?" isn't that critical. That's something you type in on a template. It really doesn't matter if someone else has the same name. I discovered the other day there are at least two other blogs named "What Do I Know?" out there. Fortunately they're pretty good - though one doesn't seem to be very active. And you can change this any time you like with little trouble or consequence.

2. The url seems to be the critical one. Mine is much longer than I'd like. I wasn't prepared when I set up my site and when the set up steps asked me for a url, I tried one, but it didn't work. It had an example with a "name-anothername.blogspot.com" and that's how steve got inserted into the name. I've looked and there wasn't another "whatdoino.blogspot.com" but I thought I was following the directions and by the time I started asking questions, it seemed like a bad idea to change the url. Why? Because, by then Google and Yahoo and Technorati (Technorati is a site that monitors blogs) knew where I was and I didn't want to mess with that.
So, figure out a couple of possible url's. For Blogspot, it will be "blogname.blogspot.com". Then go see if anything shows up and sign up right away. But have a couple of backup url's just in case you can't use the first or second one. And in the beginning, before anyone really knows your blog is up, you can probably change it easily or even make a new one.

3. Blogger is going to ask you to pick a template. Panic sets in. What if I pick a bad one? Well, you can change it later. But I'd suggest you check out 20-50 Blogspot blogs.
At the top of a Blogspot blog is toolbar like line that includes the search blog window and a "next blog" link. When you click it you go to some random blog. (It appears that most of them are blogs that just had a new post.) Anyway you can see a lot of different blogs. Look at the design - back ground colors, title boxes, what kinds of columns on the right and/or left, etc. There are also different patterns you can choose from. Look through a number of blogs so you can find templates you like. The Blogger page also has in the lower right Blogs of Note that you can check out to get ideas too.

There's a reason there are so many blogspot blogs. They are easy to set up and maintain. And the help files are pretty easy to follow too.

Alaska Electronic Health Record Initiative

The other day I was invited to go to a focus group today. I only knew it had something to do with health. I had never been to a focus group before, so I thought it would be interesting. Plus they offered lunch and $25.
We got a presentation about the Alaska Electronic Health Record Initiative. We learned that this is being promoted by a couple of groups I'd never heard of. Alaska Chart Link and the EHR Alliance are putting together a plan for electronic health care records in the state of Alaska. They had a grant or two as did 34 other states for this. We were told how this was going to improve:

The quality of health care by

• improving timely access to records
• increasing health safety
• decreasing health costs
• increasing access to care
• increasing the health of Alaskans in general
• increasing patient privacy and records

There were nine of us around the table. Mostly over 40, probably 50, though there were several younger folks too. A number of people were involved with health care.

Finally, after about half an hour, we were asked what we thought. Records security was probably the biggest concern. Who would have control? How can you say these are secure? Well, this is inevitable so I'm glad someone is doing it right. These were various reactions.

Then they had us looking at a couple of different logos to get our reactions.

There was a lot more talking to us than I expected. In part they were trying to get the idea across of what Electronic Health Record stuff was about. We did have a pretty lively group and I think everyone spoke up at least once.

No pictures, didn't seem appropriate.

Afterward, I learned that one of the groups was a physician group and I knew (and respect) two of the doctors on the list. Their concern, I was told, was that this was coming inevitably, and the doctors wanted to frame a system that was set up for the benefit of doctors and patients rather than health care institutions and insurance companies. That put a totally different spin on it, which should have been part of the presentation. After all, I do like the convenience of atm machines and being able to get money from anywhere in the world. And I like being able to book my own airline flights and get my boarding pass on my computer. So if electronic health records are coming, it would be better to have doctors and patients having a strong say in how they are structured. But, it's all in the details and you can be sure the large health systems, insurance, and drug companies are going to want to shape this in ways that increase their profits. Michael Moore, are you on top of this one?

Here's a link to a pdf file on this.

Potter Marsh Swans

Stopping at Potter
Summer north to winter south
Swans rest then fly on.

Lazy Sunday - and shameless pandering pet pics

There was a phone message Saturday evening from our birder friend that we should check out the long-tailed duck at Lake Spenard/Lake Hood. As it turned out we'd been invited to brunch at a friend's near Lake Spenard for Sunday. We pulled into the parking lot by the little park, took out the binoculars, and confidently walked up to the water. A brief scan spotted a white looking bird, and there it was in the middle of the lake. Clear and beautiful in my binoculars, but nothing in my camera. But we couldn't even find long tailed duck in our Alaska bird book. Then we went to brunch. We were greated by Bracha who was so excited we offered to take her for a walk to work off some of that energy.

Janet's house was really comfortable. She'd set the table so nicely, it all looked so inviting. And the healthy quiche was delicious, not to mention all the fruit. And we talked for several hours. The cat - well there were two - eventually appeared on my lap while we were eating and talking. Joel, your mother says hello

After we went back to the lake to show Janet the duck. And on our way home we went back to see if it would get close enough to get it in my camera. It got close enough, unfortunately, I didn't get close enough. But this float plane lake is supposed to be one of the busiest in the world. Well, Lake Hood, to which it is connected is.




Later, I looked up long tail dog on the internet and found out it used to be called old squaw. That was in my book. If you want to see one, you can go here. This one looks just like the one we saw.

Tom Anderson Sentencing - Five Years

Tom Anderson was sentenced to five years in prison today, but a lot more happened in court this morning than that. I'm still sorting through it all. When I wrote my first post on the Anderson trial I said there might be problems because I knew Tom. He'd been my student. In the field of public administration. He'd had ethics in some of my classes. But because of this I couldn't say things that I'd learned in our student-teacher relationship. So I've only written stuff here that has come from other sources - mainly the trial.

It's been difficult acting here in two different roles - one as an amateur journalist, the other as the observer of my former student. It became clear early on that he was guilty and given that, I wondered why did he insist on going to trial? Why didn't he work out a deal like the others? We even learned that he had worn a wire for a while, but not what happened.

Today we got some answers to those questions.


He'd been offered a deaL Basically:
1. He had to plead guilty to one felony charge.
2. There were no guarantees on penalties.
3. He had to do what the government told him to do.

Through testimony from two attorneys who preceded Stockler as Anderson's attorney - Jeff Feldman and Craig Howard - we learned about the deal and the conditions (listed above.) Several things were happening in his life.
1. His girlfriend - and now wife - was pregnant and they wanted to get married.
2. The legislative session was going to begin and the government wanted him to wear a wire in Juneau.

He was getting very stressed working for the FBI. Secretly taping others was uncomfortable. He had been allowed to tell his father (former head of the state troopers) what he was doing but it was difficult lying to his fiance about where he was going all the time. Feldman said that in the summer of 2005, Tom's only job was working (without pay, of course) for the government. The government wanted him to go to Juneau for the session and continue taping people. Feldman said that Tom felt his job as representative was to do the legislative work of his constituents and he couldn't do that if he were working full time as an undercover agent.

You can be skeptical of some of that, particularly in light of his working for what he thought was Cornell instead of his constituents. Yet I think that humans have an ability to delude themselves into believing that what they are doing is ok. I don't think it is far fetched that Tom really did believe that since he agreed ideologically with what he was being asked to do, that it was really ok. Obviously he knew it didn't look good - or they wouldn't have had to launder the payments. As his teacher, these are the points that are haunting me. It wasn't pleasant seeing him sentenced even though it was the correct thing to do.

That doesn't excuse it - as he acknowledged today - but it may help explain it. His choice was to take a single felony - and his first two attorneys said when they saw the tapes they knew he was in trouble - or risk being convicted of what turned out to be seven felonies. He let the first attorney go. It wasn't clear why Feldman did not continue to represent Anderson. The ADN in December 2006 reported Feldman said there was a conflict in schedules. In any case, it appears that Craig Howard was let go because of the requirement to accept one felony. It's not clear what happened with Feldman. Feldman said, not only was the agreement the investigators wanted Anderson to sign unique among the many he'd seen, he also had never seen a client turn down the chance to reduce the charges like this.

Paul Stockler, was a gentler, kinder version of the attorney we saw at the trial. He'd learned a lot from this trial he said. He tried to strike a balance between admitting that Anderson had been guilty of serious crimes and deserved to be punished and advocating for leniency in the sentencing.

Thanks to the Alaska Public Radio Network, who posted the court recording on their website, below is Tom Anderson's statement to the court. You can judge it for yourself.

Tom Anderson's Statement to the Court imported by AKRaven

There's lots more to write about, but I'm trying to sort it out. As you can see from this post, I've got a ways to go.

John Henry Browne's Response to Magitstrate's Ruling and Court Efficiency

The Anchorage Daily News reported yesterday that the Defense "Motion To Suppress Statements Allegedly Made in Violation of Miranda and the Fifth Amendment" did not persuade the magistrate judge who said the evidence should be allowed. The final decision is up to Judge Sedwick. I posted both sides' Statements of Fact in the previous two posts.

The article is interesting to me also in what it tells us about Kohring's defense attorney. He's not going to be the polite, cooperative colleague that Kott attorney Wendt was. He's may even make Anderson's attorney look warm and fuzzy. Lisa Demer further on in the article gives us Defense attorney John Henry Browne's (see a little about him in an earlier post):

Browne [Kohring's attorney] said Friday it won't be a big deal if the judge follows the recommendation and allows the evidence.

"My opinion is that Mr. Kohring didn't say anything incriminating to begin with," he said. "But I was just filing the motions in order to be a good lawyer and to make a record because I think what the government did when they told him 'You give us consent or we'll use the search warrant' is not legal."

If it won't be a big deal, then why file the motion? One big gain Browne gets by filing the motion is learning the government's version of this story. Up til the government filed their argument against the motion, he mainly had his own client's version of events. Now he gets to go into court a little better prepared knowing where the prosecutors agree with his client and where and how they don't. Fewer surprises. And saying, "It won't be a big deal" sounds like he's putting the best spin on losing, when he actually got what he needed when the government filed its argument. At least that's one interpretation of this action.

But I'm still scratching my head about this part:

Prosecutors wanted Browne to agree to allow a single FBI agent to authenticate any secretly made recordings involving Kohring before they are played for jurors.

No way, Browne responded.

That means prosecutors must call as witnesses an FBI employee directly involved with any recording they want jurors to hear. Agents from all over the country were involved in monitoring telephone calls of Veco Corp. executives as well as happenings in Suite 604 of the Baranof Hotel.

But this isn't all of the story. On the ADN Alaska politics blog Demer added a little more to this story.

Browne says in an e-mail that he filed in court on Thursday.

"I am not trying to be difficult but the GOVERNMENT is trying to put my client, who never voted for Veco, or promised to vote for Veco, in Prison. This allegation is based on the ATTEMPT to BORROW a pick-up truck, an internship that his nephew was qualified for (and brought up by Smith and Allen) and personal gifts of under $1,000. Sorry, but if that what the Government wants to do then the Government is going to have to work for it and spend every last dime of the taxpayers money doing so."

He signs it "Respectfully, JHB."

OK, his job as the Defense attorney is to give his client the best case he can. And he's reminding the taxpayers that they are paying for the government to railroad his innocent client. But given the previous two trials and Governor Palin's ability to ride the anti-corruption wave into greater than 85% popularity I'm not sure that's going to sell. People may think that forcing the FBI to fly up countless agents is just a waste of everyone's time and money. The defense in the Kott case agreed to the the arrangement the government proposed - to allow one agent to certify all the tapes. And Judge Sedwick has proven to be a very practical judge and interested in doing things efficiently, as long as the effect is neutral. On the other hand if an agent or two is unable to get to court on time and that results some tapes not being played, that helps his client, but not necessarily justice.

On the other hand, the first responder to Demer's blog post suggested the Alaska attorneys might have too cozy a relationship with the prosecutors:

Wise move not to hire an Alaskan attorney, must have found out that the only difference in prosecutor and defense attorneys in AK is who signs the paycheck and where they got their designer suit. They have to work together every day, something as insignificant as a man's life and future just gets in the way of court house harmony and future private practices. Finding "friendlier" barristers is practically unheard of. Sort of like letting the foxes run the henhouse.

But then only one of the one prosecutor will be from Alaska, the other is from DC.

It's highly unlikely that any of the jury will have read the article, let alone the blog comment so they won't be prejudiced by that. But if Browne says things like that in court, and appears to be dragging things out just for the sake of making the Prosecution work harder, I suspect the jury will see through that.

Kohring Trial - Prosecution's Response

Yesterday I posted the Defense's Statements of Fact in their "Motion To Suppress Statements Allegedly Made in Violation of Mirand and the Fifth Amendment."
Below is the Prosecutor's version of those same "facts." While these are court documents, they are pretty interesting to read. They talk about how the FBI contacted Kohring and then how they treated him when they met him at his office which they searched while they interrogated him. As you'll see when you read this, the refute what the Defense said about his not being allowed to go to the bathroom or call his attorney. I apologize for the difficult reading. I recommend that you click on the pictures to enlarge them. They're still less than idea, but readable. These are photos of the documents on the Clerk's Office public computer.

Note: They say they "sought to obtain Kohring's voluntary consent to perform the search as a professional courtesy to Kohring given his status as an elected official." What does that mean? That rather than breaking down the door (which they probably wouldn't reimburse him for) they ask him for his keys? A professional courtesy? You mean elected officials get a special deal that mere mortals don't get? Or was that just BS to make Kohring think he was getting special treatment?











"Agent Vanderploeg recalls showing Kohring a copy of the search warrant and the items to be seized list... The FBI did not demand or force Kohring to sign the consent form"

Here's what Kohring's attorney wrote (see previous post) “The agents told Mr. Kohring they possessed a warrant to search his offices but never produced or even displayed such warrant. Then, still without producing the warrant, they threatened Mr. Kohring with disclosure to the press of any refusal to cooperate with the government, thereby forcing Kohring, a highly visible, elected public official with no prior involvement with law enforcement or criminal justice procedures to acquiesce to the search and sign a consent waiver rather than force execution of the warrant.”







"During the interview, Kohring indicated he understood that he was not under arrest, was free to leave, and was not required to answer the agents questions."

The Defense wrote, “The agents made clear that due to the serious nature of the meeting and the fact that Kohring was indeed a suspect, he would not be free to leave. “

If I recall correctly in the Kott trial, under questioning, one of the FBI agents said it was FBI policy NOT to tape the interrogations. It seems to me that this whole motion would never have happened if they did tape them. But given a presumption that the FBI are more likely to tell the truth, and since given that they can corroborate each other's version of what happened, it certainly gives the FBI a lot of leeway. Maybe if some judges began to say that "without a tape it is not possible to determine where the truth lies, so I accept the defendant's motion" that the FBI would reconsider their policy. It isn't like they don't have a lot of taping equipment available, given how much time they spent tapping phones and taping other conversations.

A Hint of What is to Come in the Kohring Trial

Last week I dropped by the Court House to go through the Kohring Docket. I was struck by the huge difference in how the Defense and Prosecution told the story about how the FBI contacted Kohring, searched his office, and interrogated Kohring. They have the same characters and locale, but what happens in each is extremely different. This all got written up because the defense wanted all the evidence gathered in the search and the interrogation to be dismissed because Kohring wasn't told his Miranda Rights. Below is the story from the court documents so you can read it yourself. In light of Lisa Demer's recent article this may be a clue to how this trial is going to go. First, here I'm posting the Defense's Statement of Facts. Then tomorrow I'll post what the Prosecution said about the same events. Then I'll talk about this in a third post in relation to what has transpired in the last week. The trial begins a week from Monday, on October 22, 2005.

NOTE: First I used my digital camera to take pictures of the documents on the computer screen. I thought that was hard to read, so I broke down and got a Pacer account (that allows you to get US Court documents on the web.) They came out as PDF files I can't cut and paste text. So these are really small. But you can click on the picture of the document and it will appear large enough to read reasonably comfortably. I've also left the computer images below so you can see the difference, and even let me know if you have a preference. You can enlarge those too.


Kohring Defense "MOTION TO SUPPRESS STATEMENTS ELICITED IN VIOLATION OF MIRANDA AND THE FIFTH AMENDMENT"

Statement of Facts: [Click on Document to Enlarge]













The following is the same material but as photos from the Court Clerk's public computer. I added the description because the pictures are so bad. You can click them to enlarge them. If you read the stuff above, it's the same thing just in a different format.

Page 1 of "MOTION TO SUPPRESS STATEMENTS ELICITED IN VIOLATION OF MIRANDA AND THE FIFTH AMENDMENT" Statement of Facts begins on line 19, starts, "On August 31, 2006, at roughly eleven in the morning, Special Agent Alan Vanderploeg of the FBI called State Representative Victor Kohring on his cellular telephone and insisted upon meeting with him in person at his Wasilla legislative offices." Click on the picture below to enlarge it to readable size.





Pages 2-3, begin..."to his Wasilla offices because it was 'very important." Vanderploeg, though never disclosed the nature of the "very important" business. Ex. A. Decl. of Victor Kohring.
Upon Kohring's arrival approximately fifteen minutes later, five armed FBI agents who were already waiting there, created a quite intimidating scene in the Wasilla Legislative Office Building before attemptig to gain his cnsent for a search of the premises." Click on the photo to enlarge to readable size.

Installation of Rabbi Michael Oblath

Tonight Congregation Beth Sholom in Anchorage, Alaska had a dinner and installation at services for our new rabbi, Michael Oblath. It was probably the first time a new rabbi has been welcomed in the Dena'ina lanaguage which is the language of the original inhabitants of the Anchorage area. He was welcomed by

• Regina Boisclair, Cardinal Newman Chair, at Alaska Pacific University,
• Jonathon Ross, President and CEO, Alaska Native Heritage Center (in Dena'ina language)
• Marla Greenstein, President of Congregation Beth Sholom
• Anchorage Mayor, Mark Begich
• Alaska Governor Sarah Palin

In the service, following the dinner Rabbi Lennard Thal, Senior Vice President for Reform Judiasm, and an old friend and mentor of Rabbi Oblath installed Rabbi Oblath with warmth and wit. All in all it was a very uplifting evening. You can see and hear highlights in the brief video above.

Where did all those falling leaves fall?

The other day I posted a video of the leaves falling in our backyard. So now I'm posting the consequences. Note, the birch trees are pretty much naked. The cottonwood still has a lot left. And as you can see the maples are still pretty full.

And the yet unfallen maple leaves.

So today I moved leaves around, mostly as mulch to cover the flower beds for the winter.

Alaska Apple Users Group

Second Wednesday of the month is the AAUG meeting at the Anchorage Museum. I've posted on these meetings before here, here, and here. I really look forward to them. All of us oddballs who prefer macs to pcs come together and get shown different ways to take advantage of our machines. And then there are all the freebies. Well, tonight I scored. At the review table was a macbook case to be reviewed.
If you review something, you get to keep it. In the past I've mostly reviewed books and software. I did a wrist pad once. That was more like today. But I've been wanting something slim to slide my laptop into and here it is. And the review should be easy.

You can see it is just big enough for the MacBook. It has great zippers with indentations that fit my fingers. It doesn't have a handle though. But it does have thick, but light, padding.

And I sat next to a guy named Zack who showed me some cool things I can do on my keyboard and also helped me change the default screensaver file type from tiff to jpg. And saw some good friends. And had some nibbles. Oh, it's called LA robe protection from be.ez. And I just checked, it's $24.99 on Amazon. So the first draft of my review is done. No nagging emails at the end of the month asking where the review is, right Guy?

Dialogue Alaska

I went to a community meeting today (well it's yesterday now) at the BP Center. Alaska Common Ground, with money from the Council on Public Policy Education, is putting together a couple of public forums to get people together to talk about public policy issues in Alaska. This was something of an organizing meeting. Bill Hall has been the main person behind this all. Below is a short clip of video and photos I took at the meeting.

In with the new (CH2M Hill) and Out with the old (VECO)

I got the picture of the Veco building in mid August. A couple of weeks ago the new owner of Veco, CH2M Hill put up their sign and I finally got around to getting the after picture. They even repainted the metal on the bench. Maybe things will be different.





Fortune Magazine last year rated them the 80th Best Company to work for in the US. CH2M Hill is an employee owned company and being on this list is a good thing. But like all such lists we need to take it with a grain of salt. Enron was once on that list, and while they probably were a good company to work for, they ultimately were not a good company.





The Center for Public Integrity lists CH2M Hill in its Windfalls of War page identifying work it is doing in Iraq.

Background

The Colorado-based company offers engineering, construction and operations services with a special focus on hazardous-waste cleanup, waste-treatment design, and transportation projects. CH2M Hill is employee-owned and has more than 10,000 employees worldwide. The company name comes in part from the initials of the founders, Cornell, Hayes, Howland and Merryfield; after a 1971 merger with Clair A. Hill & Associates, Hill was added to the name.
Iraq contracts

CH2M Hill, in a joint venture with Parsons Water Infrastructure Inc., is providing support to the Public Works and Water Sector program office under the Coalition Provisional Authority's Project Management Office. The contract, which was awarded on March 10, 2004, is worth almost $28.5 million. According to a Democratic congressional report, the joint-venture is overseeing work done by four different companies—Fluor, Washington Group International, Black & Veatch and AMEC—on public works and water projects.

CH2M Hill also has a contract through a consortium with Spanish companies Dragados and Soluziona for "electrical power generation" worth $12.7 million. Dragados has reportedly opted out of the deal, in part because of a policy not to perform work in Iraq, a spokesman for the company said. This contract was awarded on Feb. 6, 2004.

Their corporate website includes a page on Social Responsibility.

A Shared Commitment to Social Responsibility

Executing projects to improve the quality of life shows only part of CH2M HILL's commitment to working without boundaries. The other part, not seen in technical reports or engineering drawings, takes shape in the hands and hearts of our employees; we volunteer time, donate funds, and contribute in-kind gifts to support scores of worthy causes in the communities where we live and worked.

CH2M HILL's Community Partners program focuses our endeavors into four areas:

* Global Responsibility — providing reliable infrastructure, clean water, opportunities for women, and hope for future generations in developing countries
* Educational Outreach — fostering interest in careers in engineering and technology through involvement in educational programs at all levels
* Environmental Stewardship — applying eco-friendly work practices and promoting environmental responsibility
* Human Services — supporting local causes to combat issues ranging from poverty to violence, hunger, and homelessness

With luck Anchorage is getting a new corporate player with strong ethical standards that will work generously with our community.

It's Autumn, The Leaves are Falling

Who's Writing Dan Fagan's Oil Columns?

Today's Dan Fagan column was, what, his third or fourth on oil? Has anyone besides me noticed that when he writes about oil his style changes completely? The normal stream of conscious ramble that we hear on his radio shows and the rest of his columns is gone. When he writes about oil the columns have a real structure, lines of argument with supporting facts. (Remember facts don't have to be true, but they are concrete enough to be tested for truth.) The closing lines actually bring some closure by referencing the beginning. Today he starts with a McCarthyism theme and brings us back to it at the end.

So, does the ADN have some kind of written agreement with their regular columnists in which the writers say that what they write is their own writing, and they aren't having others supply them with a draft or more? I don't know for sure that Fagan has ghost writers, but the difference in style between most of the articles and the oil articles is really pronounced.

So who might be writing the oil pieces? The Voice of the Times regularly represented the oil industry in their columns, in fact they were owned by Veco, now CH2M Hill. OK, so Allen and Smith are out of the picture now, but they probably had people writing the columns for them anyway. Are those folks still at it, helping Fagan now?

The basic points seem to be:

* The PPT tax is giving Alaska an extra billion so why change it?
* Tax high and you get nothing, tax low and you get a lot
* Government is bad, oil companies are good
* Keep the tax climate stable
* Sarah Palin's an idiot to want to change the PPT tax (on the other hand she's clever, go figure)
* The tax wasn't corrupted by VECO, they didn't get what they wanted.

Here's a comparison of what appear to be oil industry talking points.

Notes: Fagan Column Sept 2, 2007
John Shively, President Resource Development Council, August President's message
Gail Phillips, Voice of the Times, 10/6/07

Of course, 20% was the amount the oil companies agreed on with the Governor Murkowski. We know that good bargainers don't start out with what they are willing to accept. They probably would have been happy with 25% or even 30%. But I'm not here to argue the facts, but the style and the lack of originality of the columns. Here's another comparison:



Notes: Fagan Column Oct. 7, 2007
Alaska Oil and Gas Association (AOGA) Pioneer TV Spot
Gail Phillips, same link as above

My point is that even if someone else isn't giving Dan a draft to work from, he's not being an original columnist on oil, but is merely giving us the oil company's talking points. We had that with the Voice of the Times. And after the Veco, I mean, Kott trial, we know that they were doing more than passing out talking points. Isn't this enough reason to give Dan his pink slip?


If not, there's another problem. Dan is starting to repeat himself. Below you can see what was in the June 17 column and what reappeared in the October 7 column.


June 17, 2007

In Canada the government wanted more cash out of companies developing oil sands in Alberta. So Canadian politicians lowered royalty rates.

That's right, lowered them. What happened? Alberta's oil sands royalty revenue increased 12-fold in just three years. Lowering royalty rates made oil sand development palatable for industry so they invested more.

Then again on October 7, 2007

Remember what happened in Canada? The government wanted more cash out of companies developing oil sands in Alberta so it lowered royalty rates. Lowered them. Those politicians must have been shills of the industry, corrupt and anti-Canadian.

What happened when royalty rates dropped? Within three years, Alberta's oil sands revenue increased 12-fold.

I don't agree with the people who want Fagan's column cut because of his views. But if he's not really writing his own stuff, if he's getting drafts or talking points from the oil industry, then he shouldn't be a regular columnist. And if he's running out of things to say and has to pad his columns with things he wrote just a few months ago, then it's time to bring in someone fresh, someone who can write original, thoughtful columns.

World's Northernmost Hindu Temple?

I'm teaching a class this semester for the Honors College at UAA. We only have a few students who are taking a directed study. The title, adapted a little from what the original professor had set up, is "Searching for Truth in Anchorage: Through Science, Art, and Faith." This week we focused on the Hindu religion - first a dinner on Tuesday with Dr. Rashmi Prasad at Bombay Deluxe Restaurant. Today we visited the Shri Ganesha Mandir. Practically invisible from the street, this small temple is in a larger building and is like walking into another world.

Dr. Prasad said he thought this might be the most Northern Hindu temple in the world. A quick google search didn't locate any that are further north. Mandirnet.org
shows temples in Stockholm and outside Oslo, but south of Anchorage, slightly. There is no listing for Russia the only other country with a large population this far north. The link also gives a lot of interesting material on Hinduism.

First Frost

There was frost on the deck this morning, though by the time I got up it was already 35 degrees Fahrenheit. And the sun was warm later in the day.

Hair - Forty Years Later

We saw Theatre Artists United's production of Hair last night at Out North. Fun. The music still stands up after all these years. I couldn't believe that all the songs were familiar. I saw it long ago in LA, but never had the album. But so many of them were hits on their own. The small band under Steven Alvarez' direction filled the theater with music. The twenty or so actors filled the stage with and at times the audience with movement and song.

I couldn't help wondering what it all meant to the actors none of whom was born when Hair first came out. The emotional edge of 1968 didn't translate into 2007. The whole tension of Claude dealing with the draft board, the generational chasm over sex, drugs, and rock and roll that underlie the whole show no longer reverberate like they did then. That's not to say the issues are gone, but back then, guys' hair over their ears and lapping down the neck was a sign of rebellion. Today's shaved heads are more like the old traditional crew cuts and military cuts the long hair was repudiating. What was most shocking in 1968 was the fact that a Broadway show included the whole cast full frontal nude. But without the music it wouldn't have made it. This production doesn't include that scene. It really isn't necessary, and director Christian Heppinstall said that having a 16 year old actor precluded it anyway. I'd also note, that it is nice when the actors are picked based on talent whether they have perfect Hollywood faces and bodies or not. There were real people on the stage - all of them talented.

Anyway, it was fun. If you're in Anchorage during October I'd recommend it. The clips above, like always, are a spectators fuzzy digital camera view of events. Not great video or sound, but a sense of what was happening But I'm getting better with iMovie.

Google Hits and Misses

It's interesting to see how people get to this site. I've posted about this before in Blogging is Like Fishing. I'm constantly amazed by what people are looking for or that I actually show up on page 1 of their google search. Lately, people have searched for

• Alaska Mushrooms,
  
• various places we stayed in India and Thailand, including
  
• "prevention taken to stop the turning of yellow over the taj mahal,"
  
• several hits for 'bibidibobididoo' (I guess some one showed Cinderella somewhere),
• "things to do on a sunny day in anchorage",
  
• Dan Fagan,
  
• Termination Dust.
  
• Carnival Cruise line queries (usually about getting from the Anchorage Airport to the cruise.
  
• people related to the Kott trial. The day after the trial Debora Stovern was searched more than anyone else.
  

And the other day someone googled

• "lemon and peppers Hindu talisman."
  

That's when I learned that not all my pictures have stayed visible - I had a picture of such a lemon and peppers under a car parked in Goa.

But today I got a pretty creepy one and I couldn't imagine where the googler was sent on my site for this. Someone in Abijan, Cote D'Ivoire

Referring URL		http://www.google.fr...hl=fr&start=130&sa=N
Search Engine		google.fr
Search Words		2007 email contact of nazi germany director and staff

You can click on the URL to see what he got. The ones I saw would not get him contact with any nazis. Below is what he got on my website - a strange collection of posts that had one, or at most two, of the words he was looking for. You can see how random it is below. And I have no idea how Google decided to include some pages with 2007 in them and not others. I've left out most of the 2007's:

Les termes de recherche suivants ont été mis en valeur :

2007

email

contact

nazi

germany

director

staff

Germany has the Goethe Institutes

Sunday, April 29, 2007

a community member on the steering committee and member of the Mayor's staff,

"There was something in the disk of his smile - a kind of mischievous exuberance, more honest and more excited than mere happiness - that pierced me to the heart. It was the work of a second, the eye contact between us.

His parents were never able to get visas out of Germany.

he talks about how the Nazis are manipulating language to effectively get the German people to support the Nazi Party, a particularly appropriate topic for those living under the Bush regime. It is a fascinating account of day-to-day life of a Jewish professor in Nazi Germany. He had converted to Christianity and was married to an 'Aryan' and had been on the front lines for Germany in WWI, all of which helped delay his being taken to the concentration camps. The first volume covers 1933-1941.

Christian, a former student of mine, and the director, writer, and an actor in the play, told me it was going to be a comedic look at the porn industry.

I wasn't able to meet any of the volunteers while we were in India in November (though I had some email contact and one good phone conversation).

People Lose - Dot Com Wins

I've been pretty annoyed that the Anchorage Daily News has been putting a People section on page 2 of the main section. It's the equivalent of putting candy at the checkout stand in the supermarket. Why does this gossip about celebrities rate such a prominent spot in the paper?






Yesterday, I noticed that instead of people on page A2, it said Online at adn.com. People's gone. That can only be an improvement. Even if it's replaced by an ad for the newspaper's online version. Actually, it is reasonable to be pointing to the ADN website because they can put lots more material up there - as they did with all the audio and video tapes from the Anderson and Kott trials.

Nationally people are watching to see if newspapers can survive the internet. The ADN seems to be doing a good job in this proactively meeting this challenge.






What I didn't notice until today is that the People section didn't go away. It's now taking a full page, but on D3. OK, D is the View section - cooking, advice columns, movies, comics.
People, if we have to have it, fits much better in here away from the so called hard news.

More Fall Views

Doing a lot of home administrative tasks the last few days - paperwork, cleaning, sorting, organizing, etc. Yesterday we learned that one of our group members from the Wales writing workshop was in the hospital here in Anchorage so we went to visit. Above is a picture from the fourth floor at Regional Hospital.

And today coming back from a meeting on the biketrail while it's still ice free, I enjoyed the golden birch leaves along the bike trail.

October 1 - Eastern Promises

We went to a late afternoon movie. Eastern Promises was an interesting movie that kept my attention. A little too grisly for my taste, but I learned a little about vory v zakone.

These clips should give you a sense of the movie without spoiling anything.

October 1, 2007 - Leadership Anchorage and Clerk's Office

It was Joan's birthday today. We went out for dinner last night with friends. Today the rain reminded me of Portland. I had a meeting at the Alaska Humanities Forum with former student of mine and new MPA (they don't all get indicted) Jim MacKenzie, who's the new director of Leadership Anchorage. Jim's had an interesting career, strongly influenced by joining the Jet Program
where he taught English in Japan. He ended up staying for nine years I think, with various jobs - hotels, airlines - and getting married before coming back home to Alaska. Here he worked for a number of years on the staff at the Japanese Consulate General's office. It often surprises people when Jim starts speaking in fluent Japanese.

Then I stopped at the US District Court Clerk's Office to start getting up to speed for the Kohring trial that beings October 22.

Here are the charges. After the Anderson and Kott trials, they look familiar - conspiracy, extortion, and bribery. There’s also a motion to suppress evidence from the initial search of Kohring’s office and interrogation. The press has covered this, but reading the defense’s motion describing what happened that morning and then reading the government’s version is like reading about two totally different events. I’ll share that here when we get closer to the trial.




This is a large file so you should be able to double click it to see it better. I also saw that Kohring's local attorney is Wayne Anthony Ross. The internet is full of Ross links, that one was just the first that popped up. Kohring also is represented by Seattle attorney John Henry Browne. Here's what Adam Liptak wrote in the New York Times about Browne (I'm assuming this is the same Browne):

On Second Thought, Let’s Just Rate All the Lawyers

Published: July 2, 2007

John Henry Browne, a criminal defense lawyer in Seattle, was steamed. A new Web site that rates lawyers the way Zagat rates restaurants, with numbers, had assigned him a low score.

So Mr. Browne filed a class-action lawsuit last month.

“We want to shut the site down,” he said.

The site is called Avvo.com, and Mr. Browne’s first rating on its 10-point scale was 3.7, a score in a range that the site labels “caution.” After he complained, the rating was changed to 5.5, or “average.”

Mr. Browne said he deserved better. As evidence, he said a magazine had called him a “super lawyer.”

But it was Bernie Willard Potter’s initial score of 6.2, or “good,” that drove Mr. Browne out of his mind. Here Mr. Browne had a point. Mr. Potter, another Seattle lawyer, was in fact not likely to provide effective representation, on account of possessing neither a law license nor a pulse.

“I do take offense,” Mr. Browne said, “when I get rated lower than a dead, disbarred lawyer.”

Crown Maker

The dentist sent me to get the color right for my new crown. I never even knew this job existed, but I was quickly taken in by Ken Clester as he talked about his job. When someone really loves something, it doesn't matter what it is - when they talk about it, it's interesting. Here's a bit I had space for on the chip in my camera.