TPMtv Guide: Tuesday, June 5
Note to Alaska Senator Ted Stevens: just because you’re really far away doesn’t mean we can’t see what you’re doing. Stevens, a Republican, is one of the oldest and longest-serving members of the Senate (which might explain his geriatric confusion of the Internet for a “series of tubes”). You might also remember him generally as one of Washington’s most renowned pork-meisters. But Stevens is also moving closer and closer to a major corruption scandal in the state of Alaska, and that’s what we want to catch you up on in today’s episode of TPMtv.
First, there’s VECO Corporation. VECO is a major oil services corporation in the state of Alaska. It employs a lot of people up there, a very major player in the state. About a month ago two of the main executives of the company – CEO Bill Allen and Vice President and lobbyist Rick Smith – pled guilty to bribing public officials. The names of those officials haven’t been made public yet, but according to published reports out of the state of Alaska, one of those public officials is Senator Stevens’s son. His name is Ben Stevens, and he’s a Republican Alaska State Senator; in fact he’s the President of the State Senate.
In addition to being an unnamed coconspirator in these VECO plea agreements, State Senator Stevens’s office was raided by the FBI last September. (And yet, in the face of it all he boldly and defiantly continues to wear his Looney Tunes tie.)
So then – we’ve got two main executives of VECO Corporation, the major Alaska oil services company, pleading guilty to bribing public officials. At least five Alaskan state officeholders have been implicated although they have not been named yet. Here’s where we get to federal Senator Stevens, Papa Bear, the big honcho down in Washington D.C.
Senator Stevens’s potential involvement in the scandal has to do with the renovation of his house in Alaska seven years ago. Here’s how it went down: up in Alaska there is a contractor called Augie Paone. Seven years ago he was minding his own business when he got a call from Bill Allen, the CEO of VECO Corporation (and bribery-guilty-pleader). Allen calls up Paone and informs him that VECO would like to hire him to renovate Senator Stevens’s house. What is a major Alaska oil services corporation doing renovating an Alaska Senator’s home? Good question.
Such a good question that it seems Paone actually asked it of himself. In a recent interview with the Anchorage Daily News he said he felt kind of uncomfortable when Allen first contacted him. Here’s what he said:
Bill Allen and some of the Veco boys, some of the Veco guys, were the ones that approached me and wanted to know if I could give them a hand. I did it more as a favor, you know. It's one of those things when somebody is the head, and packs that much power and asks you for a favor, it's kind of hard to say no.
So, VECO Corporation hires the contractor Paone to renovate Stevens’s house. He goes ahead and does it, doing all the backing and forthing and signing off on things with VECO Corporation, and sends the invoices to VECO Corporation. Eventually a check arrives from Senator Stevens. It appears that this check is drawn from a special account set aside specifically for this renovation.
Throughout all of this, Paone had never met Senator Stevens. The two men had no contact at all. Here’s another quote Paone gave to KTUU Channel 2:
The senator doesn't know me, so some of the people I had contacts with were more familiar with the senator, so they kind of took over his interests and they kind of overviewed the billings. After they saw them, it was just faxed over to the senator and the senator a few days later just mailed me a check.
So let’s recap: Ted Stevens is a senior senator from the state of Alaska. Seven years ago Stevens renovated his home. Only he didn’t renovate it, VECO Corporation and its CEO Bill Allen had Stevens’s home renovated for him.
That’s a very odd arrangement. Even more odd when you consider that the same man, VECO CEO Bill Allen, has pled guilty to bribing lawmakers in the state of Alaska.
Federal officials seem to think this is a fairly odd arrangement too, because about six months ago FBI agents interviewed the contractor, Paone, and Paone also gave testimony before the grand jury investigating VECO.
VECO Corporation and Bill Allen aren’t talking. Senator Stevens will give no comment whatsoever having anything to do with this arrangement. And Paone, the contractor, was talking (and quite liberally so), but when we tried to get in touch with him at the end of last week we discovered that he himself has just hired a lawyer, so he’s no longer talking to the press either.
Needless to say, we are going to keep digging into this case and when we find out more information we’ll be bringing it to you at tpmmuckraker.com.
Has anyone figured out what VECO was getting in the way of ear marks from Stevens for the renovation. There is bound to be a quid pro quo here.
BTW to me this is TPMtv at its best. Josh does a great job of clearly laying out a story that others would make appear complicated.
I would recommend he hire someone to brush his hair for him though.
June 5, 2007 10:31 AM | Reply | Permalink
I wonder if his house needed renovation because of permafrost melt.
MW
June 5, 2007 10:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks for covering this. I have been watching it locally here in Anchorage. I pasted a few post I made on another forum--mainly for the links that give some background, and a little about another bribery scandal involving private prisons. Let's clean house from our local cities to Congress.
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Prosecutors quote Bobrick telling an informant that he and Anderson were "pitching a bunch of people" to get money for the legislator. Anderson was indicted in December on seven felony counts including bribery, extortion and money laundering. He has pleaded not guilty. His trial is scheduled to begin June 25... http://www.adn.com/news/politics/fbi/story/8889399p-8789732c.html
GIRDWOOD: Veco approved some invoices for 2000 upgrade at senator's house, says builder. By RICHARD MAUER Anchorage Daily News Published: May 29, 2007 Last Modified: May 29, 2007 at 08:45 AM The FBI and a federal grand jury have been investigating an extensive remodeling project at U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens' home in Girdwood that involved the top executive of Veco Corp. in the hiring of at least one of the key contractors. Three contractors who worked on the project said in recent interviews with the Daily News that the FBI asked them to turn over their records from the job. One said he was called to testify about the project before a federal grand jury in Anchorage in December... http://www.adn.com/news/politics/story/8928969p-8829178c.html FBI
corruption investigation includes audio, video By KYLE HOPKINS Anchorage Daily News Published: May 29, 2007 Last Modified: May 29, 2007 at 01:13 PM Evidence in the corruption case against Rep. Vic Kohring, R-Wasilla, includes thousands of pages of documents and hundreds of hours of audio and video recordings, Kohring’s lawyers said today in federal court... Only a fraction of the evidence in the case specifically mentions Kohring, said defense lawyer John Henry Browne. Still, Browne said, he and his staff have to review all evidence - including nine computer discs filled with documents and recordings, plus two hard drives full of information - and there was no way to do that by early July... http://www.adn.com/news/politics/fbi/story/8929221p-8829429c.html
It's getting very entertaining.
Recall petition to target Kohring By ANDREW WELLNER Anchorage Daily News Published: May 13, 2007 Last Modified: May 13, 2007 at 07:18 AM WASILLA - A Wasilla city councilman said he plans to try to recall Rep. Vic Kohring, a Wasilla Republican who has been indicted in the legislative bribery scandal. Kohring, 48, pleaded not guilty May 4 to four federal charges of bribery and extortion linked to the Legislature’s negotiations last year over an oil profits tax and a natural gas pipeline. Councilman Mark Ewing said Saturday he’s writing a recall petition and expects to send it with a list of 100 or more signatures to Juneau in a week. If that petition is accepted, he will have to gather more than 700 signatures on another petition to get the recall put to a vote...
Here is an article that give some of the background on our scandal here.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/6/1/25154/39090
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/6/2/24517/58089
Fool you once, shame on them.
Fool you twice, shame on you.
Fool you thrice, Hellooooooo?
I
June 5, 2007 1:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
Just a little correction to this story: Ben Stevens was president of the Alaska Senate, but is no longer. He's been the subject of questions about corruption for a long time, particularly in relation to his "consulting" fees from VECO and for his work with companies that received grants from the Alaska Fisheries Marketing Board (which Ted Stevens set up), & he chose not to run again for the legislature. His term ended in January when the new legislature was sworn in.
June 6, 2007 1:29 PM | Reply | Permalink