Word: smaltz
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Once favored to become Mississippi's first black Governor, Espy is looking at more than six years in prison if convicted on all counts. But many familiar with the case believe Smaltz is unlikely to convince a jury that the young, personable Espy schemed to defraud the people...
After spending almost three years and more than $9 million, Donald Smaltz became the first among the independent counsels examining the behavior of the Clinton Administration to bring charges against his main quarry. Smaltz threw a whole catalog at Espy, producing multiple charges out of a small set of incidents. The 39 criminal counts accuse Espy of accepting gifts and favors from government-regulated businesses and then trying to cover...
...charges allege that among items Espy accepted were football playoff tickets, plane trips and limousine rides from Tyson Foods; luggage and U.S. Open tennis tickets from Sun-Diamond Growers; and tickets to an N.B.A. championship game. In all, Smaltz values the freebies at $35,458. As the transgressions came to light, the indictment claims, Espy scrambled to conceal them or to make belated reimbursement. He may be most vulnerable to the charge that he had a clerk alter an itinerary for a January 1994 Dallas Cowboys football game to delete references to Tyson before giving the document to investigators. Smaltz...
...down by the time the case goes to trial, possibly next spring or summer. Some charges are based on a law to prevent meat inspectors from being bribed into approving unsavory products--a rarely used statute and one never before applied to a Secretary of Agriculture. Another area where Smaltz may have trouble before a judge or jury: sources close to Tyson say the football tickets and other items were solicited by Espy's then girlfriend, without his direction...
...Like many scandals, this case will likely turn on the cover-up. The charge of witness-tampering and altering documents over a trip to a Dallas Cowboys game courtesy of Tyson foods is, says Novak, "the only juicy part." Without convictions on those two, Smaltz will have fallen short. And remember, there's always the presidential pardon...