Word: abscam
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1980-1980
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...ABSCAM's first trial reels on, with more to come...
...caught Melvin Weinberg, now 55, trying to fleece Singer Wayne Newton and several other people of $200,000. Faced with a possible three-year prison sentence, Weinberg agreed to carry on his profession, this time for the law. He became one of the principals in ABSCAM,* the investigation in which FBI agents posing as Arabs tried to entice members of Congress and other public officials into taking bribes. The operation so far has led to indictments against 19 people, six of them Congressmen...
Wearing a cream-colored suit, brown-tinted aviator glasses and diamond rings on each pinkie, Weinberg last week began a new role: as the star witness of the first ABSCAM trial. The defendants are Mayor Angelo Errichetti of Camden, N.J., and three Philadelphians: Democratic Congressman Michael ("Ozzie") Myers, City Councilman Louis C. Johanson and Lawyer Howard Criden. All are accused of accepting $50,000 from FBI agents posing as representatives of a fictitious Arab sheik in return for Myers' promise to introduce an immigration bill...
...that their clients were innocent dupes of Weinberg. They claim that he set up the meetings between their clients and the bogus Arabs, coached the defendants on what to say and assured them that they would never have to deliver on their promises. Declared Ben-Veniste: "This man is ABSCAM...
...Frontier Room, Dixie's Shasta Room, the Pine Room and the Cozy Room were raided by a task force worthy of an Abscam sting: the FBI, U.S. marshals, the South Dakota division of criminal investigation, the South Dakota Attorney General's office and the Lawrence County sheriffs office. After state officials filed public-nuisance charges against the bordellos, 27 girls and their three poodles were taken into custody as material witnesses in a federal grand jury probe. They were released and have not been seen since. A lot of people miss them...