I was told by people today, but I didn’t believe it.  Now I do.  I don’t think Peters will be indicted or have to plea to a felony.

This is unbelievable.

All I can say is that if he does skate on this deal is that he better have given up more than Bobby DeLaughter.  DeLaughter is probably re-evaluating his “mentoring” friendship with Peters ‘bout now.  With friends like Peters . . . oh, nevermind.

The USofA should have sued Peters for the WHOLE $1,000,000. Let Peter’s make up for his loss in the stock market. That’s no excuse. He recevied the $1,000,000 in ill-gotten gain and should account in dollars - not excuses - for the whole amount. No reason to coddle criminals.

DeLaughter will be/is a touch upset with the deal offered to Peters.  I don’t think DeLaugther will get or was offered a deal anywhere close to something that sweet.  But I guess Peters might be a little more valuable to the Feds…

So the feds haven’t made any announcement relating to Peters because, well, there isn’t anything to announce???  I guess you don’t announce a decision not to indict. 

This cannot be the end of the story for Peters.  He was the one with the influence to peddle, and did it apparently not just once but at least twice, and possibly many times.

The alleged bribery of Delaughter occurred in Hinds County, which is in the Southern District.  Where the heck is Dunn Lampton these days???

Explain to me how the Clarion Ledger can sub-title its article declaring Peters’ forfeiture of his law license as an ‘ultimate punishment’ if Peters is - as he quoted as stating - that he is retired from the practice of law ?

Give me a break !

Also, Peters never was officially counsel in the Eaton case. Right ?
If so, he didn’t need a law licence to do what he did.
... And he could continue to do the same backroom dishonesty without a law license if someone like DeLaughter were on the bench.

This all stinks !!!

And oh by the way, there’s this:

<block>“Balducci testified Scruggs’ team flew down $50,000 in cash to Peters and that Peters was told it was tax free because no paperwork was going to be filed."</block>

Not that I’m telling anyone in the U.S. Attorney’s office how to do their freakin’ jobs, but that’s tax evasion.  If Peters gets out of this with no jail time, he better serve up multiple giant heads on a silver platter.  Dickie’s already in the slammer, and that was apparently done without any help from Peters, so who’s it gonna be?  DeLaughter is small potatoes, and is already toast anyway based on Langston’s guilty plea.

Alan, remind me—wasn’t P.L. Blake in the loop somehow with one of these DeLaughter schemes?  If so, then I’m betting that’s where this is headed.  $40 million of Dickie’s tobacco money slipped through P.L.’s grubby fingers on the way to God-only-knows where.  Dickie, Zach, Balducci, Patterson and Langston have apparently stonewalled the feds about P.L. Dickie’s billions can buy a certain amount of silence, but will that generosity extend all the way to Peters? 

Mehbe.  Mehbe not.

RFAC, keep this in mind . . .  Your scenario of not reporting $50K would presume federal AND state tax evasion (by somebody).  You could certainly make the same argument about Langston funnelling $10M (in tranches of 1, 4 and 5 million) to PL Blake per testimony.  If either Langston didn’t report the expense (w2 or 1099) to Blake or if Blake didn’t report that income on HIS taxes, there’s a major problem.

The bottom line is that there are state charges-a-plenty (bribery, tax evasion, etc.) available for enterprising state law enforcement leaders that want to stop looking like trial-lawyer puppets and stop being embarassed by their lack of action.

Unless, of course, P.L. reported the $10 million but then deducted it as a business expense.

Just kidding.

With regard to state level charges, didn’t the Attorney General used to have something called a Public Integrity Division?  They’d go after people like corrupt judges, county officials, etc.  I wonder what the heck happened to those guys?

Anybody remember what particular office Jim Hood was elected to?

And by the way, Alan, thanks for clarifying.  Only $10 million was passed to P.L. from Dickie via Langston.  That’s the money no one seems able to account for.  The other $40 million is being paid to P.L. over time, apparently as a success fee, a “you-make-money-when-we-make-money” sort of arrangement.

The feds will lean on Peters to tell them something, anything about P.L.  Peters doesn’t have to tell them where the $10 million went, and he probably doesn’t know anyway.  If he links P.L. to one of the DeLaughter schemes, though, then the feds might have leverage to start working on him.

Unless, of course, Obama appoints a new U.S. Attorney who is less inclined to pursue any of this.  Surely no one from Chicago would turn a blind eye to public corruption.  If one did, though, it would certainly be a fun time to resurrect this story.

I read somewhere in another blog that Lott actually submitted DeLaughter’s name to be a judge, but Cochran used a ‘pocket veto’ to block it because he had caught wind of Lott’s motive. 

I think the Fed’s are doing their work like they did with Scrugg’s “Holding it close”.  NO ONE could have believe this time last year that Scruggs would be behind bars (and his son also). 

I think the Feds have a LOT more to go with.  1.  LOTT 2. MOORE 3.  PL Blake - They want to “know where the bodies are buried”. 

Tom Dawson has already said in open court that Trent Lott is only a witness in Scruggs II and he said this when Scruggs II was to be 404b evidence of Dickie Scruggs.

Anybody remember what particular office Jim Hood was elected to?

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