A Measure of an Injustice While the Beat Gets Louder

Injustice has a way of bubbling up to the surface no matter how well it has been weighted down by those who hope it will just go away. Injustice finds a way to keep coming back even when the perpetrators thought they had safely put it in the grave, into exile or had locked it away in jail cells. The cynical purveyors of injustice always count on the public to not get involved, to move on with their lives, and to forget about what we can no longer see. And it is not to suggest that we should all subscribe to conspiracy theories, and that we should never trust the verdict of our courts or the actions of our elected officials, but when efforts are made to obscure the truth, to prevent the machinations of government and justice to operate in the open, this should concern us all.

Years have passed since Don Siegelman, under a blizzard of shady, murky or unexplained connections said that there was a political motivation behind his being the target of a government investigation. With little direct proof, it seemed like some plausible explanations would render his complaints to be filed under the usual protestations of a politician under investigation. They might be similar to the earlier complaints of convicted politicians Rudy Cunningham and Governor George Ryan. But in the years that have passed, after Cunningham and Ryan have admitted their guilt in the face of overwhelming evidence, the Alabama questions were never adequately answered by the government but were only further obfuscated, and the small bleatings of a politician under investigation now threaten to become a roar, after he has been sent to prison. Injustice has a way of bubbling to the surface.

Why should we care? Many people who were in the courtroom for closing arguments, last summer, cringed a bit during Fred Gray’s over-the-top summation because he appeared to be comparing a corruption case to Martin Luther King Jr. and the civil rights movement. This may have hurt his cause more than helping it, since neither Siegelman’s and Scrushy’s struggle was comparable to the mission of the Reverend King. But one of the King quotes he used resonated well because it refers to something that transcends the civil rights movement. He said that, “Injustice anywhere threatens justice everywhere.” And that is why we should care. No matter how anyone feels about Richard Scrushy and what he may have done to HealthSouth, or no matter how someone feels about the administration of Don Siegelman, if the two men could not receive equal and fair justice that is afforded to all Americans, then we will all be hurt by this action much more than any real or imagined transgressions the two of them are thought to be responsible for. If the government is allowed to use personal feelings to consummate a political prosecution, then we are on the slope to ripping up the Constitution and all of the guarantees and protections that it affords us all.

In the beginning, it was just Siegelman’s word buoyed somewhat by the love and affection of people he had helped (which may not have meant all that much by itself as demagoguery is often propped up in just this manner) and a few close true believers who were tapping on the drum and keeping up the beat to whomever would listen. Like the nescient beginnings of any scandal that may have a cover-up, the early complaints were scoffed at by government investigators and prosecutors, and were ignored by people alleged to be participants in the allegations. And although it was mostly confined to Alabama, the confluence of interests that passed right over Siegelman could not help but begin to raise some eyebrows. And then some things began to fall in place that made the request for answers or comment become more like a demand for explanations. Some of those events that happened after the initial Siegelman complaints are enumerated here: 1) Jack Abramoff went from dynamic businessman to disgraced and convicted lobbyist, along with his top lieutenant Michael Scanlon. Siegelman had always maintained there was an unholy alliance between Abramoff/Scanlon and Riley, and that there was a financial pipeline against his lottery that paled in comparison to the “colossal donation” of Richard Scrushy; 2) The investigation was begun by US Attorney Leura Canary, who then recused herself after Siegelman’s attorney pointed out the connections she had to Attorney General Bill Pryor, through her husband Bill Canary. This is an oft-told and well-worn tale in Alabama, and to expound on the various ramifications of the Canary-Rove and Canary-Pryor connections would be redundant at this late date. But there is one noteworthy aspect. The stated reasons for the recusal have never been released, even after numerous FOIA requests have been filed, and after the government has said there was no reason not to withhold this documentation under FOIA guidelines. At various times along the way, the government has promised that the documents would be forthcoming, but contrary to statute and even with Siegelman safely behind bars, the documents have still not been produced; 3) The controversy over the firing of eight (now nine) US Attorneys raised the possibility that the Justice Department was being politicized. The story broke last winter, almost three years after Siegelman first was saying that he was the victim of a politically charged selective prosecution. It would seem that, in light of this national scandal, his protests and requests would at least deserve to be thoroughly looked into. This is especially true when considering the recently overturned case against Georgia Thompson. The person to look at in comparing the Thompson case to the Alabama situation is not necessarily Siegelman, but Mac Roberts. Georgia Thompson was probably collateral damage in an effort to bring down a bigger fish, just like the presence of Roberts in the Siegelman trial. The evidence for a political prosecution is sometimes seen more clearly through the prism of collateral damage. Another parallel with the Siegelman case can be seen in the denials and indignation that was emanating from the US Attorney’s office, in Wisconsin, and how it appears that a good and well-meaning prosecutor got caught up in the pressure of high-stakes politics; 4) Years after Siegelman said there was a Rove-Canary connection behind derailing and destroying his life and career, a former Riley supporter, Jill Simpson surfaces with a sworn affidavit that attests to the very thing that Siegelman has been claiming; 5) A national politician with considerable political capital at stake, including aspirations to run for governor of Alabama, Congressman Artur Davis, has felt that the situation is serious enough that he has risked his reputation by asking that the Siegelman matter be added to the list of cases to be investigated for evidence of selective prosecution. It has been a long time from there to here, but a week after the doors slammed shut on his freedom, the national press and now Congress are paying attention. It is time for clear and concise answers to the questions that have been asked or for complete explanations for the proven connections that have spidered throughout this case.

So here we are. It started with an indictment and then another one and the usual denials and claims of a politician, but then something unusual happened. Out of a collection of coincidences and alleged connections, a remarkable number of Siegelman’s ethereal claims came to life and turned out to be true. These points do not necessarily prove that he is innocent or make the efforts of the prosecutors groundless, but now that he has been sent away to prison, it means that anything less than a full and immediate investigation of these claims would be evidence of criminality at the highest level of our government.

In recent developments, the illogical nature of the prosecution’s argument for horse-trading restitution undermines the government’s righteous indignation over the capricious nature of the prosecution. Siegelman has argued that restitution should not be paid for calculations based on charges that he was acquitted of. Curiously, the prosecutors chose not to argue solely against this argument by stating that their basis for restitution is justified. Instead, after restating some of the facts brought out in the trial, they ask that the judge could simply substitute restitution for jail time. They do this mindful that Judge Fuller originally set the base sentence at 15-19 years, before halving that sentence to 7 years 4 months. Essentially, it appears that the government wants to utilize this discrepancy as a tool to be used to thwart Siegelman’s ability to file legal motions or to exercise his Constitutional right to appeal. In light of the five points listed above that began as the whispers and complaints of an indicted politician but has since grown into the steady and hard-to-ignore drumbeat of an injustice that has spread from Alabama to Washington, and is not likely to fade away until some answers are forthcoming, it is time for some answers to counterbalance the mad rush to overly punish a man after a questionable prosecution. [Just in, almost simultaneously with the posting of this entry: Judge Fuller has reversed his decision about Siegelman paying restitution for things he was acquitted for. US Attorney Franklin has reiterated that the government may appeal the sentence as too lenient.]

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Over two and a half years ago, I went to Birmingham, fully expecting the government to put Scrushy in jail. After that fiasco, I followed Scrushy to Montgomery to watch the do-over trial. I knew little about Siegelman and was still expecting the government to put Scrushy in jail. In the Georgia Thompson case, the appellate court called the prosecution’s evidence “beyond thin,” and that would adequately describe what I saw last spring, in Montgomery. I have talked to many supporters and detractors of both defendants, and I have read a great deal—for and against—of whatever has been written about the two of them. I know that both of them made mistakes, some of these would undermine Scrushy’s ability to be the CEO of a major publicly-traded company (setting aside the Birmingham case for the time being) and some mistakes that would be serious election issues for a candidate for governor. But setting all of that aside, and looking at how this case unfolded, the evidence was certainly beyond thin which was what opened my eyes to the possibility that at least some of what Siegelman has been saying might be true. With my eyes still very open to both sides of this case, and with Scrushy and Siegelman now rotting in jail, I am still waiting for the government to even show an interest in the truth.

[In my last entry, it said that I might shut up for awhile. But with a lot of things going on, that might actually be hard to do. So stay tuned.]