Lawyers say the darndest things.
Posted on 10/14/2007 7:54:45 AM PDT by khnyny
The bribery charges against Rep. William J. Jefferson (D-La.), who was videotaped accepting $100,000 in cash, should be dismissed because such an act is technically closer to influence-peddling, defense argued yesterday in an Alexandria courtroom.
Jefferson's attorneys made no admission that he engaged in improper conduct, but one, Amy Jackson, argued that even if the government's allegations are true, they do not constitute bribery under federal law.
"We think using influence is not a bribe," Jackson told U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III in seeking to have some of the charges dismissed.
Prosecutors scoffed at the argument, and Ellis seemed skeptical. He offered several hypothetical situations that he likened to the conduct alleged in Jefferson's case and questioned whether such situations do not amount to bribery.
Jackson maintained that federal law defines bribery as receiving payment for an official act. Congress spells out influence-peddling as improper in its ethics rules but neglects to do so specifically under the bribery statute, she said.
If Jefferson had taken money in exchange for sponsoring legislation or voting a particular way on a specific bill, it would have constituted a bribe, Jackson said. But she contended that the misdeeds prosecutors allege -- helping to broker business deals in Africa in exchange for hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments -- fall outside that definition.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
In the fine tradition of “what the meaning of the word is” is...
The most discouraging thing about logic like this is that it actually makes sense to Democrats, and they make up at least fifty percent of the electorate.
Our country is indeed in for hard times ahead.
The argument could also be made that William J. Jefferson studied at the “Marion Barry School of Public Service and Politics”. They both have mastered the fine art of appearing on videotape./s
Actual quote from Marion Barry (there are many of these superb little gems): “If you take out the killings, Washington actually has a very very low crime rate.” — M. Barry, Mayor of Washington, DC
And DC wonders why it will never (thank God) become a state.
When is a bribe not a bribe? When Democrats engage in it. Pelosi’s idea of an “ethical congress”.
Like Murtha and ABSCAM.
Lawyers say the darndest things.
To all
TERM LIMITS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
12 years in the House (6 terms)
12 years in the Senate (2 terms)
Thats my preference though any limit would be an improvement.
Check out the following:
Congressman Tries to Move His Trial to Washington
By PHILIP SHENON
WASHINGTON, Sept. 7 — Representative William J. Jefferson said Friday that the Justice Department was trying him in Virginia, and not Washington, because it knew that a jury in the capital would probably include many more fellow African-Americans.
Lawyers for Mr. Jefferson, a Louisiana Democrat who is charged with corruption, demanded in court papers that the trial be moved to Washington, where the population is mostly black and where many of the crimes are said to have occurred, from the mostly white suburbs of Northern Virginia.
Mr. Jefferson is accused of hiding $90,000 in bribe money in his home freezer in Washington.
“The circumstances here present a prima facie case that venue was selected in the Eastern District of Virginia in order to obtain a jury pool with fewer African-Americans,” his lawyer, Robert P. Trout, wrote in papers filed in Alexandria, Va., where the lawmaker was indicted in June.
“The court has an obligation to ensure that the forum selection in this case was not tainted by radically discriminatory motive,” Mr. Trout added. “The center of gravity of this case is plainly not in the Eastern District of Virginia. The overwhelming majority of the events took place in the District of Columbia.”....
Each day our society gets a little more crazy.
Otherwise sane people actually listen to and give serious consideration to the insane reasoning, excuses, arguments of moral equivalency, and acusations of racism and bias spewed out by muslims, black race pimps, illegals and every other crook, criminal, terrorist supporter and scoundrel who can get anywhere near a microphone or a NY Times scribbler.
There are no longer any limits to the craziness that is treated as normal or rational, even when people know it is not.
There was a time when idiots and subversives like Al Gore, William J. Jefferson, Cynthia McKinney, Al Sharpron, Imad Hamad (of ADC) and various CAIR officials would have been publically ridiculed for the inanities they mutter.
But today even incoherent and illogical musings from certifiable terrorist supporters like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are discussed seiously.
William Jefferson is as whacky as Al Sharpton, as slimy as Jesse Jackson and as innocent as OJ Simpson but he still serves in Congress and the media pretends he has something legitimate to say.
What this country needs is a real Attorney General and political leaders that don’t spend all of their time slopping at the trough or pandering to the moonbats, terrorists and criminals.
Whew!!!!!
Amen Fellow Freeper.....I long for the day when a REAL leader emerges from the muck we call, politics. I had hoped F. Thompson would be that man....thus far he has yet to make an impact.
Gawd, anything except that shrill woman in the baby blue pants suit!
We think using influence is not a bribe,
And fellatio is not sex.
Of course, he’s a liberal, and lives by a double standard.
Bribery (n):
Bribery is the practice by which a person who can take decision or action on behalf of others by virtue of his authority or position is influenced by paying or offering monetary benefits for influencing him to take an action or decision which he would not have done otherwise. Eg. Offering money to the police officer to record a wrong verification report.
Nice try attorneys, but accepting cash as payment for using your influence IS bribery, and a crime.
As another poster pointed out: it’s from the same school of thought that gave us the great line - “it depends upon what your definition of “is”, is.
What I want to know is, why is taking so long for this scumbag to go to trial? It’s been over two years.
What is the point of all this? A black jury will never convict him.
What are you talking about?
in other words if william jefferson (dem. - la.) wasn’t a member of the house of representatives, somebody would still have handed him a suitcase with 90g’s in it, and he still would have hitched a ride with the national guard to retrieve it from the meat locker in his house. sounds like a front page story straight from the ny slimes.
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