Texas' Tom DeLay Is One Step Closer to a Trial
By HILARY HYLTON / AUSTIN Hilary Hylton / Austin – Mon Aug 23, 6:40 pm ET
As the campaign season heats up, Democrats may soon have something to distract the public from the ethics controversies of Democratic U.S. Representatives Charles Rangel and Maxine Waters. On Aug. 24, former Republican majority leader Tom DeLay - who last appeared in the spotlight on TV's Dancing with the Stars - is expected to sashay into an Austin courtroom for a pre-trial hearing in his five-year battle over a money-laundering charge. The hearing brings the former Texas Congressman, once known as the "Hammer" for his take-no-prisoners approach to legislation, one step closer to a trial. It is also likely to remind voters of the ethical lapses that proved disastrous for the GOP back in 2006.
DeLay's legal tango with arch nemesis Austin district attorney Ronnie Earle has actually turned into a legal version of the classic Sydney Pollack flick They Shoot Horses, Don't They? - an exhausting, desperate dance marathon. DeLay's attorney, Dick DeGuerin, a legal star of the Texas defense bar, says it has been an ordeal for his client, with the experience being especially hard on DeLay's family. "But he is chipper and always upbeat," DeGuerin says, adding that his client's personality is completely the opposite of his public image as the arm-twisting Hammer, an image he says was concocted and embellished by his political enemies. (See Dancing with the Stars: The Tom DeLay Edition.)
In 2005, an Austin grand jury handed down indictments against DeLay and two fundraising operatives, John Colyandro and Jim Ellis, who were his aides. The three men are charged with moving $190,000 in corporate campaign contributions from Texas businesses through the Republican National Committee to DeLay's Texas political-action committee, Texans for a Republican Majority (TRMPAC). The maneuver, prosecutors say, was an attempt to sidestep the state's ban on corporate funding of state races. TRMPAC proved valuable in helping Republicans win control of the Texas House of Representatives for the first time since Reconstruction and put them in the driver's seat during a mid-decade congressional redistricting process widely seen as a DeLay operation. (See the top 10 performing politicians.)
The stakes are high for DeLay and his fellow defendants - they face felony charges with at least one year in prison for money-laundering, more for alleged conspiracy - and attorneys for all three men are promising an aggressive and further protracted fight. But it has been a long, long contest - and any kind of conclusion is not in sight. DeLay has been eager to go to trial since Day One, DeGuerin says, but appeals by the former Congressman's fellow defendants, Ellis and Colyandro, plus counterappeals by the prosecution, have slowed the process. This spring, the state's top appellate criminal court cleared the way for a trial, but left open the possibility that the question that brought the case to their attention - whether the state's money-laundering law included the moving of checks by the defendants - could be pursued post-trial. (See why the feds dropped their investigation of DeLay in the Abramoff case.)
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http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/08599201140300
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