Roll Call: Senate ethics probe could access potentially incriminating tapes of GOP senator
An FBI tape of telephone conversations involving Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) are fair game for the Senate Ethics Committee if an inquiry into the senator's possible role in Alaskan corruption is launched, according to Roll Call's Emily Pierce.
The tapes, which reportedly contain a conversation between Stevens and oil company executive Bill Allen, were "made as part of a wide-ranging public corruption investigation in Alaska." Allen pleaded guilty to bribing Alaskan legislators earlier this year.
According to court precedent, a committee probe may be authorized to hear the recordings -- even if Stevens is not yet indicted -- although there is no evidence as of yet that it has taken steps to do so.
"In a little-known 1981 court ruling, a federal judge declared that Senate Ethics Committee investigators fall within the legal definition of federal law enforcement agencies and must be granted access to legally obtained wiretap evidence, particularly as it relates to actions involving a Senator," reports Roll Call.
The 1981 ruling "involved taped conversations of then-Sen. Howard Cannon (D-Nev.) and Teamsters union officials who were indicted for plotting to bribe the Senator."
The ethics committee may not be able to obtain the tapes, however, until after all potential grand jury investigations are concluded by the Department of Justice, Pierce points out.
"Stevens remains under a cloud of suspicion, given that FBI and Internal Revenue Service agents raided his Girdwood, Alaska, home in July as part of an extensive inquiry into corruption in the state connected to the oil and fishing industries," the story continues. "Bill Allen, the former CEO of the oil services giant VECO, pleaded guilty this spring to bribing state lawmakers, including Stevens’ son, Ben, and is cooperating with federal officials in that investigation."
“I would not be surprised by that at all," former Senate Ethics Committee legal counsel Wilson Abney said of a possible investigation. "It would be consistent with the committee’s history."
The Associated Press previously reported that Allen had agreed to the taping after being confronted by the FBI, and has confessed to prosecutors that he "paid his employees to renovate the senator's house."
"The secret recordings suggest the Justice Department was eyeing Stevens long before June, when the Republican senator first publicly acknowledged he was under scrutiny," according to the AP. "At that time, it appeared Stevens was a new focus in a case that had already ensnared several state lawmakers."
"In addition to work on Stevens' house," AP continued, "a former employee said VECO workers helped run the senator's fund-raisers on company time, a practice that appears to violate campaign finance laws."
"The FBI, IRS, DOJ and departments of Commerce and Interior also are investigating Stevens over a series of earmarks he inserted into appropriations bills for the Alaska SeaLife Center," said Roll Call. "Those funds eventually made their way to Trevor McCabe, a former Stevens aide and business partner of his son. McCabe also is under investigation."
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