PWN3D
Posted on 04/26/2006 7:32:16 PM PDT by CedarDave
ALBUQUERQUE (AP) - Jurors viewed a videotape Tuesday showing then-state Treasurer Robert Vigil accepting cash payments last year of $11,500 from an investment adviser seeking business from the treasurer’s office.
Federal prosecutors allege the payments were kickbacks to Vigil in exchange for steering state business to California-based investment adviser Kent Nelson.
Vigil’s defense team contends the payments were campaign contributions.
The videotape was shown during Vigil’s trial on racketeering and extortion charges. Nelson was cooperating with federal investigators when he secretly taped the meeting with Vigil last May 2nd.
Vigil resigned last October. He has pleaded not guilty to 28 counts of extortion, money laundering, racketeering and racketeering conspiracy.
(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
The defense insisted the entire tape be shown to the jury, including the part when Nelson went into the restroom and is shown taking a leak in the urinal.
PWN3D
Ah, that makes it OK then. Silly me.
Well, of course. They neglected to mention the guys party affiliation.
The ABQJournal mentions party affiliation only once, in reference to who the party was going to support for treasurer in the next primary election.
http://www.abqjournal.com/north/454282north_news04-26-06.htm
(The Journal is now free once again though you have to watch a 30 second ad before being given access to the article)
On Tuesday, Gov. Bill Richardson’s boxing buddy and campaign contributor Guy Riordan was implicated in the scandal by former Treasurer Michael Montoya. Montoya, testifying at Vigil’s trial in federal court, said he received as much as $100,000 in kickbacks from Riordan in exchange for investment contracts. Most of this money, Montoya said, was passed to him at restroom stalls at restaurants.
Riordan’s lawyer hotly denied this. And the Albuquerque investment broker/commercial-hunting ranch owner hasn’t been charged with any crime. But Richardson wasn’t taking any chances.
Shortly after the story hit the wires, the governor’s office zapped out a press statement saying Riordan had been yanked off the state Game Commission, and Richardson would donate the $24,000 in campaign donations he received from Riordan to “New Mexico charities.”
What a mug -- straight out of central casting.
Riordan and company were and are all certifiable A-holes.
The only real news on this story is that it's being prosecuted.
This has been going on since Statehood in NM, and before (Major Domo politics).
Vigil and Montoya just got a little too open and blatant.
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