One More Question for Michael Guest: Why Didn't you Prosecute Ed Peters?
You can ask Madison-Rankin DA Michael Guest one question—what would it be? If you’re like me, it would be why hasn’t he prosecuted Ed Peters for conspiring to bribe Bobby DeLaughter?
But if you’re Clarion-Ledger columnist Sid Salter, it would be questions like “what’s your favorite color?” Here is Salter’s Sunday morning with Michael Guest. Questions included soft-balls such as “what attracted you to the job of District Attorney” and “tell us about your childhood.”
Inexplicably, Salter did not ask Guest why he did not bring charges against Ed Peters for conspiracy. Peters, Joey Langston, Steve Patterson and Tim Balducci met at the Jackson or Madison airport to discuss the bribing Judge Bobby DeLaughter. Both the Jackson and Madison airports are in Guest’s jurisdiction.
Federal authorities granted Peters immunity for his cooperation with respect to federal charges. But Guest could have asserted state charges against Peters (and others). His failure to do so is one of the mysteries of the judicial bribery scandal. It would have been nice if Salter had asked him about it.
Although this is definitely a question that should be answered by Guest, I have another question. "Why did Guest NOT indict the Brandon officer, who hit & killed a 19 year old in Nov 2008, while allegedly responding to a burglary?" Undisputed, the officer was driving with a 16 year old in his passenger seat at the time of the collision, who disappeared from the scene by some means & was never taken to any medical facility. As stated by Brandon Police Chief McBroom, the officer was driving within proper police procedure for BPD. Did Guest ever take this case to a grand jury and, if so, what evidence did he present other than the rushed 1 week tox report of the 19 year old?
Let me address that question directly, Mr. Thomas.
First, the "Sunday Morning" interview is a personality profile, not an inquisition. I think most people who aren't "certified civil trial advocates" realize that. It's a chance for readers to get a more personal look at figures in the new and interesting Mississippians. Notice, we've yet to feature you in the profile...
Second, I asked Mississippi's Attorney General Jim Hood about state prosecution of these defendants at a Clarion-Ledger Editorial Board meeting in early 2008 — a video of which which was published on our Web site and my column recounting that interview was published statewide the next day — years before you started blowing hot air about this issue on your blog.
District attorneys in multiple venues in Mississippi have already spoken to the fact that since Mississippi's attorney general didn't prosecute public corruption cases against Peters, DeLaughter, Langston, Scruggs, Balducci, Patterson, et al, then they didn't think they had the resources to go after such charges either. If you will recall in the Neshoba County state charges against former Klansmen Edgar Ray Killen and other high profile cases, the local DA got the active support of General Hood's office and his personal intervention in the case.
But Hood took a pass on the judicial bribery cases altogether — all of them.
Where were you in 2008 on this issue, Mr. Thomas? Massaging your "certified civil trial advocate" plaque?
What color is that, Bubba?
Next time you have a question about how I go about the interview process, be sure and weigh in again. I love interaction with "certified civil trial advocates" — being a mere mortal and all.
Here's what I wrote about this issue in 2008:
- Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Sid Salter/The Clarion-Ledger
Hood: The good ship 'appearance of impropriety' already sailed
Attorney General Jim Hood has gone to great lengths in recent days to quell what he sees as a barrage of criticism from the media and from bloggers.
Hood's written newspaper columns complaining about "pundits" and "bloggers" generating criticism of his office and suggested that those critics want to "do them harm" - "them" being "Mississippi's families."
He's granted TV and newspaper interviews in which he dismissed suggestions that he return campaign funds donated by at least three sources who have already entered plea bargains in a federal judicial bribery probe. He suggested that it was unfair for him to be asked to return the donations because Republicans had taken political action committee donations and that: "There's a danger in our politics, when people, corporations are able to buy offices that belong to the people."
That reference came after Hood railed about "big corporations" circumventing Mississippi laws prohibiting campaign contributions over $1,000 by making legal PAC donations exceeding that amount - which is true. But in the same breath, Hood draws a distinction between PAC donations from "big corporations" and the $400,000 in legal campaign contributions he received from the Democratic Attorneys General Association's PAC - which is the same amount donated by Oxford attorney Dickie Scruggs and Booneville attorney Joey Langston.
In November, a federal grand jury indicted Scruggs, his son Zach Scruggs, attorneys Tim Balducci and Sidney Backstrom and former state auditor Steve Patterson on federal bribery charges involving a lawsuit over $26 million in legal fees connected to litigation on behalf of Hurricane Katrina victims. Scruggs, his son, and Backstrom have pleaded not guilty.
But Balducci and Patterson have pleaded guilty and Langston has pleaded guilty to bribery charges in a separate case in Jackson. Hood's close ties to Langston and Scruggs have been criticized, - fairly and unfairly -in connection with the judicial bribery allegations, the Katrina cases pushed by Scruggs against State Farm and the entire concept of outside counsel contracts.
Let's set the record straight - Jim Hood hasn't been accused of a crime by the feds in these cases.
But Hood is drawing fire for not filing state charges against his campaign finance sugar daddies. His defense? Hood says his friendships, legal associations and his acceptance of campaign donations from these figures have created the "appearance of impropriety" and that from a legal standpoint, it would be unethical for him to even try to prosecute the cases.
"The average guy is going to say, 'If he's that close to somebody, he doesn't need to be prosecuting the case,'" he said. "It would be like prosecuting relatives."
From a legal standpoint, lawyers I trust tell me Hood's telling the God's truth about that. But selling a legal precept like that to laymen is a tough sell.
That "average man" Hood talks about sees a public official not prosecuting people who've given him large sums of money and there is an "appearance of impropriety" all right, but the appearance is related to Hood's failure to prosecute, not his abstention from doing so. That "appearance of impropriety" ship, in the minds of many it would seem, has long since sailed.
Hood says the local district attorneys in Lafayette and Hinds are the appropriate ones to prosecute this case and that his office will assist if necessary, but that he won't and can't.
Thank God Jim Hood didn't take any campaign cash from Edgar Ray Killen or Frank Melton - cases in which Hood had no problem pressing state charges.
But admitted felons shouldn't be able to escape state charges of trying to bribe a judge because they're friends with or donors to the state's attorney general.
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Contact Perspective Editor Sid Salter at (601) 961-7084 or e-mail ssalter@clarionledger.com. Visit his blog at http://www.clarionledger.com.
Mr. Salter,
I am sorry that I offended you. That was not my intent.
The fact that you have questioned Hood's failure to prosecute in the judicial bribery scandal is the reason that I had hoped that you would have asked Guest about it. I respect your journalism on this issue.
I get that it was a feel-good piece. I was attempting to expose the frustration in the legal community about Peters not getting prosecuted. Guest is the only person who people thought might prosecute Peters on the state level. I apologize if I did it inartfully.
As far as you making fun of my certification, I think your comments are funny and hope that was your intent. I only recently obtained this certification and it was not easy. Interested readers can read about the certification at the NBLSC's website: http://www.nblsc.us/public_information/.
The certification criteria are here: http://nblsc.us/sertification_standards_civil/.
You can also access a list of the certified civil trial advocates in Mississippi on their website. It is a list that any Mississippi litigator would be proud to be on.
Never realized Salter had such thin skin. You raise a valid point and he resorts to ad hominem attacks much like a child. One would expect a journalist to have a little more integrity than that.
Yeah, just read Salter's comments, totally out of line. With "journalists" like him the blogs are more important than ever.