Posted on 07/26/2002 9:22:40 PM PDT by TheEaglehasLanded
Panel Has Evidence of 2 Gifts to Torricelli, an Official Says By TIM GOLDEN
his article was reported by David Kocieniewski, Tim Golden and Carl Hulse and was written by Mr. Golden.
As the Senate Ethics Committee weighs charges that Senator Robert G. Torricelli improperly accepted gifts and cash from a political contributor, a government official involved in the inquiry said the panel had received sales receipts, witness testimony and other corroboration of at least two such gifts.
Advertisement
Mr. Torricelli, a New Jersey Democrat, appeared before the six members of the committee yesterday afternoon, testifying in closed session at what an adviser said was the senator's own initiative. He testified before the committee staff earlier in the week.
The acting chairman of the committee, Senator Daniel K. Inouye of Hawaii, said afterward that he hoped to conclude the inquiry by next week. But he said the members were too tired to make any decision last night on what action, if any, to take against Mr. Torricelli.
Mr. Torricelli told reporters after testifying that he should have used better judgment in his relationship with the contributor, David Chang, but that he hoped to be fully vindicated. "All I can do is apologize for the errors in judgment and also make clear that rules were not violated," he said. "There were never inappropriate gifts."
The evidence before the committee includes a November 1998 receipt for $1,877.90 for a Toshiba projection television set, indicating that it was paid for by Mr. Chang. The delivery address listed for the television is 116 Walnut Street in Englewood, N.J., which investigators believe was a typographical error. Mr. Torricelli's address at the time was 161 Walnut Street. A copy of the receipt was obtained by The New York Times.
The ethics committee also has financial records and witness testimony suggesting that Mr. Chang gave Mr. Torricelli cash to pay for a $3,816 Scottish grandfather clock he bought in September 1997, the official said.
Both the large-screen television set — which had its serial number peeled off — and the grandfather clock were seized by federal agents when they executed a search warrant last year at Mr. Torricelli's former home in Englewood, one official said.
Mr. Torricelli has repeatedly denied accepting any gifts from Mr. Chang. "Those recycled allegations that David Chang made gifts of a TV and a clock are false," said Debra DeShong, Mr. Torricelli's spokeswoman. "Senator Torricelli has provided a complete response to these allegations to the ethics committee, and when the committee's review is completed, the facts will become public."
Senate rules generally prohibit senators from accepting gifts worth more than $50 and require that all gifts be reported on disclosure forms. Mr. Torricelli has never reported any gifts from Mr. Chang.
In 1999, about six months after Mr. Torricelli took delivery of the television set, he gave Mr. Chang an $800 check, made out to cash, an official involved in the inquiry said. He later gave Mr. Chang a second check for $200. It was not clear whether the money was intended as partial repayment for the gifts.
Mr. Chang was jailed in May after pleading guilty to federal charges of obstructing justice and making $53,700 in illegal contributions to Mr. Torricelli's 1996 Senate campaign.
At his sentencing hearing, Mr. Chang described a long and close relationship with Mr. Torricelli and asserted that he lavished the senator with gifts and tens of thousands of dollars in cash in exchange for help with his various business deals.
Mr. Torricelli has denied ever extending any special help to Mr. Chang. But in 1999, Mr. Chang attended meetings Mr. Torricelli had scheduled with the South Korean finance minister and prime minister. The United States ambassador to Korea and the Korean finance minister have both said publicly that Mr. Torricelli used the meetings to promote Mr. Chang's bid to buy a troubled life insurance company from the South Korean government.
The handwritten notes of a U.S. diplomat who attended both meetings, obtained by the New York Times under the Freedom of Information Act, also indicate that Mr. Torricelli used the meetings to lobby on Mr. Chang's behalf.
After nearly four years of investigation, federal prosecutors announced in January that they would not seek criminal charges against Mr. Torricelli. Officials later said that Mr. Chang's credibility problems as a potential witness — he had repeatedly misrepresented his business activities and his personal relationships — were central to the decision.
Several government officials said prosecutors had then turned over to the Senate Ethics Committee considerable information that directly or indirectly corroborated Mr. Chang's assertions to investigators that he gave Mr. Torricelli tens of thousands of dollars in gifts and cash.
Mr. Chang's lawyer, Bradley D. Simon, said that the television set, the grandfather clock and an Oriental rug were among various gifts and cash payments that his client told investigators that he had given to Mr. Torricelli.
According to Mr. Chang, he made the gift of the television on his own initiative. An employee of Gorman's Appliances, the store that sold the television set, said yesterday that the store's owner, James Gorman, would not comment on the sale.
In the case of the grandfather clock, an official involved in the inquiry said, Mr. Chang told investigators he gave Mr. Torricelli cash to pay for it at the senator's request and even drove him in Mr. Chang's convertible Rolls-Royce sedan to pick up the clock from an antique store in Lambertville, N.J.
An official involved in the inquiry said that account was largely corroborated by telephone records showing calls from the senator to Mr. Chang and the cashing of a check by Mr. Chang that would have covered the cost of the clock.
Two people familiar with statements to the F.B.I. by the antique-store owner, Charles Buttaci, said he told agents that Mr. Torricelli came into the store one summer weekend and bargained with him for the clock, a signed Scottish tall-case clock with an elaborate painted design on the face. Mr. Buttaci and Mr. Torricelli agreed on a price of $3,600. Mr. Buttaci told investigators that the senator returned to the store several days later with a small Asian man fitting Mr. Chang's description, these two people said.
While the Asian man browsed in the store and smoked cigarettes on its covered wooden porch, Mr. Torricelli paid for the clock and arranged to have it delivered to his Englewood home. A third reported gift from Mr. Chang, a handmade Oriental rug worth $1,590, was bought on Nov. 17, 1997, and delivered to Mr. Torricelli's former wife, Susan Holloway Torricelli, a Democratic fund-raiser who is one of his closest confidants.
Copies of two receipts for the rug indicate it was bought by Mr. Chang at a store a few blocks from the senator's home and delivered to "Susan Torricelli" of Washington. The owner of the store, Shahram Nazar, said yesterday that he could not remember who picked out the carpet but that Mr. Chang had picked it up.
According to Mr. Chang's account, he made the gift at Mr. Torricelli's request. One person involved in the inquiry said that the senator and his former wife said Mr. Chang gave the gift without discussing it beforehand with Mr. Torricelli. Ms. Torricelli later surrendered the carpet to federal investigators, one person involved in the inquiry said.
Mr. Inouye said he believed that Mr. Torricelli's appearance before the ethics committee, which lasted nearly three hours, would be his last, and he added that he did not expect the panel to hear from other witnesses. The senator from Hawaii is acting as the committee's chairman in the place of Senator Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, who recused himself because of his close relationship to Mr. Torricelli.
"I don't want to be on this committee any longer," Mr. Inouye said.
AMEN !!
DITTO !!!!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.