Tag: Ray Nagin

Nagin……

The comments I’m receiving via email about Ray Nagin’s lawyer Robert Jenkins entering Federal court to try a major criminal case tomorrow are pretty amusing, especially since Jenkins, when he isn’t doing the legal pundit thing for WDSU is known mainly for his practice in New Orleans state courts. The consensus of the emails is the guy is in over his head but that Judge Berrigan will cut him some slack to compensate.

It is against that backdrop of private thoughts being shared with Slabbed about tomorrow’s criminal trial of former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin that I viewed the media stories building up to the trial. One, by NOLA.com’s Rich Rainey and Juliet Linderman relied on interviews with ol’ reliables like the BGR’s Janet Howard along with legal pundits Dane Ciolino and Grey Sexton, who both ran on at the mouth spouting tired legal cliches that bore absolutely no resemblance to what the highly accomplished, successful lawyers that I speak with were sharing with me.

Meantime over at the Advocate Gordon Russell, who covered and helped expose major facets of the public corruption at the heart of the Nagin Indictment, wrote a great piece on the topic. Gordon didn’t have to rely on any interviews since he literally lived the events from a front row seat so there are no interviews or tired cliches in his piece no sir, just Joe Friday which is exactly how old school guys like me appreciate it.

All that said there is something tangentially related to the two stories that I was immediately drawn to in the number of people commenting to each. As I write this Gordon’s piece, at the Facebook only Advocate, has one Facebook comment while Rainey and Linderman’s piece has sixty, including mainstays like Muspench and company who are folks that I term ‘high quality’ commenters. This situation is part traffic but is is also undeniably part commenting platform. Large swaths of the media runs in herds folks which is why business statisticians have the bottom 2 quartiles (or 3 quintiles) when quantifying business sector financial analysis. The following video explains:

In any event like everyone else we’ll be following the Nagin trial. Besides Gordon I’ll be looking to Jason over at AZ for context. This week ought to fun for the muckraking community down here.

I almost split my side laughing…..

After all the shit my colleague Jason Berry took from Ray Nagin and his goons for exposing their misdeeds a few years ago I know he is having fun today.  Click here folks and turn the volume up high.

In other news if you are too tired to stay up and watch the 9PM Fox 8 newscast fret not because you can read the website they are ripping off on the Wiser Foundation anytime you like.

If I may be so bold as to suggest those wanting perspective on Heebe’s internet commenter witch hunt….

You should click here because the harassment first became manifest when former NOLA City Attorney Bob Ellis threatened Jason Berry at American Zombie with a SLAPP suit.

Less than one year later Interim parish Prez Steve TheRiot sued the blogosphere conducting a witch hunt for certain online critics. Slabbed was mentioned in TheRiot’s suit in a clear shot across our bow.

And then there are the SLAPP suits from Canada, well covered here on Slabbed.

The dots are all out there folks, they just need connecting.

The crushing of Big D continues as Hendrikus “Hank” Ton cops a plea and agrees to squeal

So now that Dominick “Big D” Fazzio’s brother in law Mark Titus has gone down in flames left to prepare for his upcoming trial with Big D from the pokey the newest defendant in the various alleged Fazzio criminal schemes, Hendrikus “Hank” Ton has copped a plea and agreed to testify against Fazzio, whose legal plight was well summarized by his attorney Buddy Lemann as quoted by Nola Media Group’s Manuel Torres:

“The guy who saved himself more than $3.5 million faces no more than 10 years,” Lemann said, referring to Ton’s maximum possible prison sentence. “But my client, the guy who simply filed the tax returns for fees that totaled no more than $15,000, faces 50 years. It’s absurd.”

Far from absurd this is the reality that is facing Fazzio and with Ton as a witness against him things are looking bad in Big D.  And with the federal grand jury closing in on Ray Ray the Chocolate Guy things are heating up as the cross hairs center on River Birch Landfill.

Ray Ray the Chocolate Guy in the news……

Today the T-P’s Hammerman and Gordon Russell delve in-depth into Ray Nagin’s involvement with Stone Age, his granite counter top side biz that is now the focus of the Federal Grand Jury investigation into post Katrina corruption in metro NOLA.  This is a telling snippet IMHO:

Nagin formed Stone Age in January 2005. But it wasn’t until April 2007 that Stone Age applied for a home improvement license, which all contractors must get from the Louisiana State Licensing Board of Contractors to perform more than $7,500 of work.

The original partnership included Nagin; his son, Jeremy; and Tarikh Duckworth, one of Nagin’s nephews.

Jason over at American Zombie was all over this years ago folks.  On Friday he got a well deserved hat tip from the Gambitman Clancy DuBos. Here is a snippet:

The TP noted in its first story about the grand jury investigation that the feds are looking into “three parallel tracks” against Nagin, who campaigned as a crusading reformer in 2002. According to the newspaper, one track involves city tech vendors who provided Nagin with luxury travel and home maintenance; another concerns the Nagin family’s countertop business and its exclusive deal with Home Depot; and a third involves suspicions that the countertop biz got free equipment and materials from city vendors.

Add to that list the City Hall email scandal. Computer records of Nagin’s schedule and emails disappeared — right after WWL-TV asked for them in a public records request. It is a federal crime to tamper with public computers, and if the tampering is done to conceal a crime, we’re talking obstruction of justice. Continue reading “Ray Ray the Chocolate Guy in the news……”

Laying down the Hammer: Hammerman asks about what Ray Nagin knew and when in the St Pierre saga

And the Hammerman concludes Ray Nagin was pretty stupid but he included this exchange involving Jackson based lawyer Danny Drake, Meffert and St. Pierre in his story on what Nagin knew and when he knew it:

In emails discussing the letter to the mayor with Meffert and their lawyer, Danny Drake, it didn’t appear that St. Pierre was trying to inform the mayor. It really came from Meffert, who suggested there was another reason to write it.

“Ok, this is my final proposed letter, this might help while still protecting all of us and without boxing us in,” Meffert wrote in an email to St. Pierre and Drake.

“OK, and just so I understand, this is a letter from me to the mayor, correct?” St. Pierre wrote back. Continue reading “Laying down the Hammer: Hammerman asks about what Ray Nagin knew and when in the St Pierre saga”

Today's rapid fire segment is sponsored by Bellesouth and Blue Moon….

A couple of days ago we welcomed a new commenter on an older post that brought word of a Jimmy Gates story in the Jackson Clarion Ledger that is related to our and Bellesouth’s  coverage of the arrest of Oxford lawyer/blogger Tom Freeland. Hatfield later was kind enough to share the hyperlink to Jimmy’s story. The short version is Team Freeland has done some medicare/medicare fraud criminal defense work winning a notable trial last year in Hattiesburg.  A short while ago they lost a similar case in Jackson and the Doc in question in that case, Cassandra Faye Thomas is staring at a very long stretch of time in the pokey now convicted for fleecing Medicaid/Medicare to the tune of $6.9MM.

A top shelf criminal defense in complex white-collar litigation does not come cheap folks and bet Doc Cassandra had to dig very deep to hire Team Freeland.  I’ll be honest and say my initial reaction was to chalk this one up to a desperate person doing anything and everything they could to avoid the pen but then I checked in with Bellesouth and my reaction to her post was HOLY CRAP! There may be a sliver of hope for Doc after all.

Next up is Hizzhonner Half Moon after I received an email and one comment on the veracity of Supasleth’s bombshell comment yesterday evening regarding Henry Mouton’s cooperation with Team Letten that included serving up Ann Duplesiss and Rene Gill Pratt. Duplesiss is a key member of Team Half-Moon and Gill Pratt is facing retrial on Dollar Bill Jefferson related corruption charges as I write this.  Jason was kind enough to stop by and help us close the circle on Duplesiss.  So the question is whether the assertion true or not.  We have no way of knowing for sure but our search for the truth has us on a path leading us back to the tip.  For our newer readers I’ll add the Sleuth has been a fairly reliable commenter here over time and Jason is certainly no slouch in that department either. Continue reading “Today's rapid fire segment is sponsored by Bellesouth and Blue Moon….”

Here is a tip for ya Mark. Don't bend over to pick up the soap. Jury finds Mark St Pierre guilty on all counts.

And as I expected St Pierre was taken into custody immediately. Hat tip ‘gate in comments with the news.

Letten still has Ray Ray the Chocolate Guy plus St Pierre’s sack of shit politician/daddy to prosecute based upon what we heard in the testimony.

Congratulations to Team Letten.

sop