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.