More Charges for Dusty Foggo?

The government has agreed to move the Dusty Foggo trial–the last remaining indictment from the Duke Cunningham scandal–to Eastern District of VA to make it easier for the CIA and its friends to testify in the trial (h/t chrisc). But the really interesting part of the news is the indication that prosecutors have found more potential charges against Foggo at precisely the same time as they announce they’re dropping charges against Brent Wilkes in the same case.

Federal prosecutors agreed Thursday to move the corruption case of former Central Intelligence Agency official Kyle “Dusty” Foggo to Virginia and hinted he will face more charges in the future.

In addition, prosecutors said they will drop charges in that case against Foggo’s lifelong friend and co-defendant, former Poway defense contractor Brent Wilkes.

[snip]

For the past several months, Foggo’s Washington, D.C.-based lawyers have asked Burns to transfer the case out of California. They said it made sense because 90 percent of the actions alleged in the complaint took place in that area and not in Southern California, and virtually all the witnesses and documents are based there.

While Burns agreed the case should be moved, both prosecutors and Wilkes balked. But on Feb. 1, Wilkes dropped his objections to the move.

The government followed suit Thursday. In a brief court filing they said that “the government has recently uncovered evidence to support additional charges” against Foggo.

Call me crazy, but it sure looks like–faced with the possibility of a 60 year jail sentence–Brent Wilkes all of a sudden remembered some evidence against Foggo that he had previously forgotten.

Duke Cunningham. The gift that keeps on giving.

Update: I’m wrong–it doesn’t look like Wilkes flipped. Perhaps Michael did, but not Wilkes.

What’s happening is a big game over venue. Foggo originally asked for venue in ED VA. The court never finally ruled on that. But then Foggo switched his request, asking that it be moved to DC. Here’s why:

Defendants Kyle Dustin Foggo and Brent Roger Wilkes have jointly moved for transfer of venue in this case to the District of Columbia, on the basis of convenience to the parties pursuant to Fed. R. Crim. P. 21(b). Defendant Wilkes has also moved for transfer pursuant to Fed. R. P. 21(a). Defendant Foggo previously filed a motion to transfer the case to the Eastern District of Virginia (“EDVA”), which was denied without prejudice, and then renewed that motion, which the Court has not ruled upon. The
government opposed all transfer motions, contending that Defendant Foggo had not met the legal standard to show that transfer was warranted. (See govt’s pleadings filed May 7, 2007 and December 21, 2007.)

The government has recently uncovered evidence to support additional charges against defendant Foggo. For some of these additional charges, venue lies only in EDVA. Accordingly, at this time the government withdraws its opposition to the transfer of the case to EDVA and moves to dismiss without prejudice the charges against defendant Wilkes, pursuant to Fed. R. Crim. P. 48(a). [my emphasis]

To which Wilkes responds:

Brent Roger Wilkes, through undersigned counsel, hereby opposes the government’s motion to dismiss without prejudice and asks that any dismissal be with prejudice. Defendants Kyle Dustin Foggo has amended his prior motion to transfer this matter to the Eastern District of Virginia to request instead that the matter be transferred to the District of the District of Columbia. The Court has indicated that it looks favorably upon this motion and will likely approve a transfer to Washington, D.C.. There does not appear to be any motion by any defendant pending to transfer this case to Eastern District of Virginia. The government, which has fought vehemently against all prior requests for transfer to the Eastern District of Virginia, in the face of imminent transfer to Washington, D.C., now withdraws its opposition to a motion no longer pending and agrees to a transfer to Virginia. The government’s proffered reason, that it has uncovered evidence of crimes prosecutable against Mr. Foggo only in Virginia, is made without support or specification. Simultaneously, the government moves to dismiss without prejudice the charges against Mr. Wilkes, no doubt intending to then indict Mr. Wilkes in Virginia, thus effectively transferring his case to a another district without Mr. Wilkes’ consent. The government’s action is a transparent attempt to forum shop. For some reason, it believes Virginia provides a more favorable forum and so it seeks to abrogate Mr. Wilkes’ right to object to a transfer to that district. [my emphasis]

Wilkes seems just as uncooperative as always. Only now he’s trying to prevent other charges–something happening entirely in VA. 

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41 replies
  1. dqueue says:

    So, should we be looking out for Wilkes’ sentencing to be delayed? Or can he pull an Abramoff and cooperate from behind the fence?

    • emptywheel says:

      I think his sentencing on the first charge will go ahead. Since hte prosecutors have already got support for a huge sentence, it’s likely he’ll get that sentence and then have to chat like Abramoff did to get it lowered. I doubt he has given them anything all THAT substantive yet–If he has flipped, it was likely only 2 weeks ago, when he withdrew is opposition to moving the trial.

      BUt the prosecutors have extra leverage over him since he got a public defender in spite of having millions stocked away somewhere.

    • Fractal says:

      24,000 interrogations at Guantanamo and elsewhere were videotaped!

      This is an incredible disclosure. Wonderful find, I’m going to use it over at TPM and/or other sites, with h/t to you, and probably going to mention it in faxes to Congressional district offices and to Obama’s & Clinton’s campaign offices. I hope this is enough to finally put some of these torture whores in jail.

      • Fractal says:

        One point of Seton Hall Law School’s report is that it will be very easy for the courts to determine how many of the 24,000 interrogation tapes were destroyed because Gitmo kept excellent written records of every single interrogation. And they also reasoned that Gitmo interrogators (who worked for many agencies besides CIA) have the same motivations to destroy tapes as the CIA did for the interrogation videotapes that it destroyed, thus the courts may be confronted with a monumental volume of criminal obstructions of justice.

      • CTuttle says:

        how many have been destroyed ???

        Here’s your answer…

        The concerns are based in part on a recent court filing by Guantanamo’s commander, Rear Adm. Mark H. Buzby, who said video surveillance recordings in several areas of the facility have been automatically overwritten and no longer exist.

        “In January 2008, it was brought to my attention that such . . . [recording] systems may have been automatically overwriting video data contained on recording devices, at predetermined intervals,” Buzby wrote. “That is, only a specified number of days’ worth of recorded data could be retained on the recording devices at a time.”

        Defense lawyers said the admission suggests that the military has not complied with a 2005 court order to preserve such evidence, even if the deletion of the recordings was inadvertent. They claim that the tapes were of potential use at forthcoming court hearings and trials, a view supported by a Seton Hall University report slated to be released today.

        http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/006997.html

        • sailmaker says:

          They need to get a court order asking for all the copies of the tapes. The Seton Hall docs said multiple agencies were reviewing the tapes (to see the effectiveness of torture/interrogation). If the tapes were overwritten daily or even weekly, a detailed analysis could not be performed. IMO there must be copies.

        • sailmaker says:

          From the Seton Hall Law School docs:

          DOD has video cameras in every Guantánamo interrogation room and each interrogation was observed by intelligence agents and other agency monitors on closed circuit units.

          Multiple intelligence-gathering agencies conducted interrogations of detainees in the Guantánamo Bay video-monitored rooms. Agencies include the CIA, Criminal Investigation Task Force, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Defense Intelligence Analysis, Army Criminal Investigative Division, Air Force Office of Special Investigations, and Naval Criminal Investigative Service.

          Detainees routinely refer to the videotapes of their interrogations.

          The government records contain graphic evidence that interrogators regularly used force and violence while interrogating detainees. These same interrogators often hindered videotaping during interrogations by covering and obstructing the surveillance cameras.

          The U.S. government keeps meticulous records of all interrogations, evidenced by FBI agent accounts of detailed logs available to provide detainees’ names, dates and room locations of interrogations, as well as the names of the interviewers. The government systematically logs all video recordings.

          http://law.shu.edu/administrat…..otaped.htm

        • CTuttle says:

          The U.S. government keeps meticulous records of all interrogations, evidenced by FBI agent accounts of detailed logs available to provide detainees’ names, dates and room locations of interrogations, as well as the names of the interviewers. The government systematically logs all video recordings.

          I seem to recall that they ‘lost’ some of Padilla’s tapes…!

        • sailmaker says:

          Yep, managed to ‘lose’ them right before Padilla went on trial. They should put a court order out on all trash collected from Gitmo so that the ‘lost’ may become ‘found’. IMO there are copies of the tapes – on hard drives etc. Gotta get ‘em before the burn date (strongly suspect shortly before the Gitmo 6 are tried).

        • Hmmm says:

          Hiya CT and aloha to you. I could be wrong, but at first naive blush, those recycled Gitmo surveillance tapes sound like a different kind of animal from the Gitmo interrogation tapes disclosed today.

      • freepatriot says:

        I doubt we’re talking about actual tapes

        wanna bet we’re talking “Digital Images” and computer disks ???

        • sailmaker says:

          A lot of people thought Nixon should have burned the tapes to save his office – Cheney was there as an intern. It can’t have escaped his notice. My guess is that there is a something like ‘pulverize the pixels’ order somewhere in the works.

  2. chrisc says:

    Wilkes is in a whole heap of trouble. The prosecutors are saying that Wilkes lied about his financial situation. Judge Burns is going to let the prosecutors have a peak at those sealed financial docs. If he lied, it could result in a perjury charge. According to the prosecutors Wilkes has been paying his lawyer and divorce case bills from assets from the sale of his business and a few houses.

    There were some pretty strange twists and turns to the sale of Wilkes’ business. It was in foreclosure. Just before the auction, a group of Wilkes’ friends formed a company and bought it. The friends live near Wilkes and they had been involved in Wilkes’ foundation- the one that gave Duke a big ol’ trophy for being a hero. The friends lobbied the local school district to lease Wilkes’ building for their new offices. The school board did authorize the staff to negotiate for the building but did not enter into any agreement. (It was going to be hard to justify the move to Wilkes’ expensive building while they were highlighting the leaky roofs and decaying portable classrooms in order to get a new school bond passed.)

    Unable to get the school district deal signed, Wilkes’ friends sold the building to another company. It would not surprise me if the friends tried to hide Wilkes’ assets from the sale.

    Prosecutors were to look at the previously sealed documents today (Friday) and if things do not match up with the information revealed in the divorce proceedings, Burns has threatened to throw Wilkes’ ass in the slammer right away.

    I still think Wilkes will remain loyal to Foggo if he is able. But Wilkes’ might have just gambled away his own freedom and his family’s financial security. It is hard to choose between your family and your BFF.

  3. bmaz says:

    Have real time issues today, but i agree that Wilkes either has, or is in the process of, turning. Even if they thought they had problems with the charges not yet tried, once charged, they would not let go of him at this point, at least not until they were getting ready to walk in the courtroom door for the start of trial. I am not so sure you are right about the sentencing on the prior case though; it is far, far more difficult to unwind or alter a sentence once it has been formally entered, and if they pound the crap out of him on it he may not see enough light at the end of the tunnel to cooperate like they want. My bet is that gets continued. Could well be wrong here, but that is my off the cuff guess. I like the phrasing “The government has agreed to move the Dusty Foggo trial…”. Heh heh, of course they agreed, it is exactly their perfect heart’s desire; that would be precisely what they would want. EDVA is a notoriously good forum for the government, notoriously bad for defendants, and all their witnesses are there. Agreed indeed.

    • emptywheel says:

      Actually. I’m wrong (I’ll post an update in a sec). Wilkes hasn’t flipped. Perhaps Michael has, though.

      The whole point about moving the trial–which the article above missed–is that Foggo is now trying to move to DC, USA is trying to move to EDVA, because the new charges have to be charged in EDVA. The sudden willingness to move to DC is an attempt to forestall charges in EDVA.

  4. freepatriot says:

    is there anything like a witness list

    any discovery or disclosure yet

    come on

    I like details

    the wheels of justice might grind exceedingly fine, but these fuckers was pretty small to begin with

  5. freepatriot says:

    those videotapes are gonna kill george

    there are at least two aspects of it that demonstrate how incompetent and criminally negligent george bush has been

    the first aspect is related to the fact that these tapes are evidence in a criminal investigation, so the destruction of the tapes is a criminal act that obstructs justice

    the second aspect revolves around America’s security. the purported reason for using the torture techniques is to keep America safe. To keep America safe, the tapes have to be analyzed to find potential terrorist plots. Since the victims are mostly foreign nationals, they don’t speak much english, so you need some translators

    but we ain’t got enough translators

    so there is no way these tapes could serve their purpose

    both of these aspects of the taping of interrogations dictate that THE TAPES CAN’T SERVE THEIR PURPOSE IF THEY ARE DESTROYED

    so the fact that the tapes were destroyed ends all speculation about why we are using the torture techniques

    can’t be to prevent further attacks, you destroyed the materials that could be used to do that

    can’t be to generate evidence to convict the criminals responsible for any attacks, you destroyed the materials that could be used to do that

    so why are we torturing people again ???

    or why does logic hate amurika ???

    • Fractal says:

      so why are we torturing people again ?

      I am convinced Bush & Cheney and their puppets are sadists & perverts; they are cruel, degraded, vicious killers; and the more they torture helpless prisoners, the more they terrify the rest of the government who know about it. It’s a sick culture of fear and degradation. They are diseased and need to be eradicated.

  6. Fractal says:

    Didn’t mean to hijack the thread with OT comments about more torture tapes.

    Wasn’t Foggo the guy who handled lots of contracting out for the CIA? Could his job have included hiring interrogators on contract to inflict “enhanced interrogation techniques” on detainees?

    • FormerFed says:

      I don’t know how the CIA is organized for contracting/procurement, but normally there is a Head of Contracting Authority (HCA) in most government agencies. As I remember some of the past articles on Foggo, it sounds like he might have held an equivalent position in CIA. Therefore he might very well have been involved in hiring the interrogators.

      • Fractal says:

        he might very well have been involved in hiring the interrogators

        Now we’re gettin’ somewhere! But there’s no chance DOJ would prosecute Foggo for war crimes committed by interrogators he hired under contract, right?

        • FormerFed says:

          No chance under current DOJ. A future DOJ – who knows. The intel crowd always likes to hide behind the “Green Door” – need to know, comparmentation, right clearance, etc.

    • bobschacht says:

      Wasn’t Foggo the guy who handled lots of contracting out for the CIA? Could his job have included hiring interrogators on contract to inflict “enhanced interrogation techniques” on detainees?

      Isn’t this whole contracting thing one of the foundations of the Bush-Cheney fascism program? What with Halliburton and the Telcoms, weren’t we about half-way to the business-run countries that Orwell was gnashing his teeth about half a century ago? Heck, I even remember “What’s good for Ford is Good for America”, but that was before Japan started making better cars.

      Bob in HI

  7. BayStateLibrul says:

    OT…

    Just doing a Friday “what-if-ing” after that Surprise House Move.

    Does Bush on Saturday, after expiration of FISA, through Executive
    Order have to tell his minions to “cease and desist” and to comply
    with the provisions that still exist?

    Who will be tracking this, cuz Bush ain’t going to do diddly…
    They are plotting strategy as we speak…

    • bobschacht says:

      Just doing a Friday “what-if-ing” after that Surprise House Move.

      Does Bush on Saturday, after expiration of FISA, through Executive
      Order have to tell his minions to “cease and desist” and to comply
      with the provisions that still exist?

      At the risk of becoming tiresome, FISA will not expire. Have you been drinking beltway koolaid? What will expire is the PAA abomination that was passed in a rush before the summer recess last August. The Prez will not need to say cease and desist about anything, unless they were doing something illegal (and yes, they probably were, but since when has that stopped the Bush-Cheney crime syndicate?)

      Bob in HI

      • BayStateLibrul says:

        Thanks for the clarification. I read Congressman Reyes letter so
        I know the FISA will not expire… What I was getting at, and I did not phrase it exactly correctly, was the the practical implications….
        i.e. things will change on Saturday and will anybody be tracking it
        so Bushie just says can’t “fuck you”?

        • bobschacht says:

          Thanks for the clarification. I read Congressman Reyes letter so
          I know the FISA will not expire… What I was getting at, and I did not phrase it exactly correctly, was the the practical implications….
          i.e. things will change on Saturday and will anybody be tracking it
          so Bushie just says can’t “fuck you”?

          But will anything really change?
          If what they were doing before was legal, they can keep on doing it (certain parts of the PAA are valid for another year)

          If what they were doing before wasn’t legal, then it is still illegal (even if they are doing it anyway.)

          So, IIRC, despite what our preznit might want you to believe, nothing has changed. Of course, IIRC, etc., and bmaz, EW, Mary and others have a much more precise understanding of these things than I do.

          YMMV!

          Bob in HI

  8. maryo2 says:

    Personal anecdote about Blackwater hiring:

    A friend of a friend was in Calfornia when a bank was robbed. He had been in the Army for the first Gulf War and in some way helped to stop the robbery by remaining calm. He was approached by a man who said “I like how you handle yourself. Do you want to be tested for a job?” He agreed to surprise testing.

    Later he was walking down the street, a car pulled alongside him. He got in and was taken to a location where a crime was in process. Somehow he passed that test, and it turns out that it was a staged crime.

    He was offered a job, and shortly thereafter he found himself working for Blackwater as a bodyguard to dimplomats in Iraq. He asked to be reassigned and is now guarding a movie star in Hollywood.

    Moral of the story = somebody indeed does hire for Blackwater.

    • BillE says:

      I heard that Chertoff was up at congress last week talking about domestic use of spy satellites. With “appropriate” controls for privacy etc. That isn’t so bad.

      Its just when somehow the Iraqis tell the contractors to split. The all come home 200,000 plus and we have most of the army over there. The Blackwater base in NC is only a few hours to DC you know.

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