Abramoff's Crimes Sign of Deeper Cesspool
By Robert Scheer, AlterNet
Posted on January 4, 2006, Printed on January 5, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/story/30381/Top Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff is set to sing, and his long list of former buddies in Congress and the Bush Administration are quaking in anticipation of possible indictments stemming from the consummate Beltway hustler's crass reign as the king of K Street.
"Casino Jack," a former head of the College Republicans and a "Pioneer"-grade fundraiser for the Bush 2000 campaign, pleaded guilty to three felony counts of conspiracy, mail fraud and tax evasion in D.C. yesterday and is set to appear in Florida today to plead guilty to fraud and conspiracy on separate charges. Abramoff and other defendants also must repay over $25 million to defrauded clients and $1.7 million to the IRS.
But most important for the nation is that Abramoff is now detailing the massive web of corruption he spun inside the Beltway which has already snared a top Bush official, procurement chief David H. Safavian, on charges of lying and obstructing a criminal investigation, and reportedly threatens dozens of other D.C. players.
"When this is all over, this will be bigger than any
in the last 50 years, both in the amount of people involved and the breadth to it," Stan Brand, a former U.S. House counsel who specializes in representing public officials accused of wrongdoing, told Bloomberg News. "It will include high-ranking members of Congress and executive branch officials."
Some of the Wild West feel of this Beltway corruption was captured in Saturday's Washington Post expose, "The DeLay-Abramoff Money Trail." It documents in chilling detail how, among other scams, Abramoff funneled a portion of the millions he had been skimming from Indian casino operators with a cool million from two Russian energy moguls through a shell organization called the U.S. Family Network -- and from there into the coffers of politicians in a position to help his clients.
http://www.alternet.org/columnists/story/30381/
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