Kott Trial - Conspiracy Charge

Conspiracy

For the conspiracy charge the jury has to agree that

• First, beginning in or about September 2005, and continuing until on or about August 30, 2006, there was an agreement between Bill Allen, Rick Smith, and Peter Kott to commit at least one crime as charged in the indictment;”

So, as a juror looking at this, I have to figure out - did they come together to agree to commit a crime? At first blush, it looks like they came together to get legislation passed. That in itself is not a crime, as Wendt emphatically told the jurors. Marsh, in the rebuttal, argued strongly that they had a plan and it was an illegal plan that linked getting the legislation passed to benefits for Kott, particularly a lobbying job when he got out of the legislature.

I think it would be a lot easier for the jury if it were a conspiracy to rob a bank. In that case it would be clear they were knowingly planning to commit a crime. In this case it is much more subtle. They never said, let’s commit bribery, extortion, and wire fraud. I wonder if Pete even knew what wire fraud is. The plans they discussed were getting ppt passed at 20/20, getting a gas pipeline in the long term, getting Kott a job when he left the legislature.

The jury is going to have to not think about the plan being simply about getting ppt passed - which they clearly did plan, and which Wendt said was 'the plan' - and think of the plan that Marsh described that linked the legislative work to the $7,993 check, the $1000 cash, the poll, and the future job. Or the plan to get Allen to pay for Pete Jr. working on Pete Sr.'s campaign, by setting up invoices that say it's for doing future flooring work.

In the Tom Anderson case I think it was clearer. They all knew they were setting up a scheme to launder money so that Cornell Enterprises could pay Anderson without people knowing where the money was coming from. Of course the jury wouldn’t know those details about Anderson, so would they think this way? Before I go too far, maybe I should read the rest of the instructions:

• Second, the defendant became a member of the conspiracy knowing of at least one of its objects and intending to help accomplish it, and;

If we look at the other charges, they are bribery and extortion and wire fraud. So let me refocus. They worked out a way to get Kott money to pay for Peter Jr. to work on his campaign.

• Third, one of the members of the conspiracy performed at least one overt act for the purpose of carrying out the conspiracy with all of you agreeing on a particular overt act that was committed.

The jury has lots of evidence that Kott took actions for Veco in the legislature. And that Allen made payments to Kott. This part shouldn't be a problem


Then the judge goes on:

• A conspiracy is a kind of criminal partnership - an agreement of two or more persons to commit one or more crimes. The crime of conspiracy is the agreement to do something unlawful; it does not matter whether the crime agreed upon was committed.

• It is not necessary that the conspirators made a formal agreement or that they agreed on every detail of the conspiracy. It is not enough however, that they simply met, discussed matters of common interest, acted in similar ways, or perhaps helped one another. You must find beyond a reasonable doubt that there was a plan to commit at least one of the crimes alleged in the indictment as an object of the conspiracy with all of you agreeing as to the particular crime which the conspirators agreed to commit.

I still expect that there will be jurors who will say, "Yes, they did exchange money for legislative work, but they didn't actually plan it. It just sort of evolved from the relationship." Or they might ask, what exactly does 'plan' mean? They never sat down and said, "OK, Kott, you do our bidding and we'll get you whatever you need." But others on the jury might counter with some examples from the tapes where Smith says, for instance, "You've got a job, now get us a bill."