I haven't seen this posted: Don Siegelman's lawyer has asked U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to intercede in the federal case that resulted in a conviction of the former Alabama Governor.
Earlier this week, Holder asked a judge to overturn the conviction of former Senator Ted Stevens on corruption charges because the prosecutors withheld evidence during the trial. According to Kilborn, he wants Holder to intercede in Siegelman's case in the same way. He said, "The prosecution of Governor Siegelman was fraught with serious and pervasive prosecutorial misconduct that warrants your immediate attention."
The four page letter to Holder sent earlier today cited three areas of prosecutorial misconduct:
When the investigation of Siegelman began in 2002, Siegelman was in a close race for Governor of Alabama with Republican Bob Riley. Leura Canary, the Middle District of Alabama U.S. Attorney who started the investigation, was married to an ally of Riley. Siegelman lost the election to Riley by a narrow margin. Canary claimed to have recused herself, but continued to monitor the case according to evidence provided by a whistle blower in the U.S. Attorney's office.
A key witness at the trial, former Siegelman aide Nick Bailey, said in a 2007 interview on "60 Minutes," that he was interviewed by prosecutors more than 70 times to rehearse his testimony and was made to write his testimony down a number of times. Kilborn said, "No evidence of such practice sessions were ever turned over to the defense. (...) During trial, we repeatedly asked for any such materials and the prosecutors ... steadfastly represented that they had produced all such ... material."
Kilborn also cited jury misconduct concerning copies of e-mails defense attorneys received anonymously. Those e-mails purported to contain exchanges between jurors during the trial, which was a violation of the judges instructions. He said that they learned after the trial that prosecutors had investigated the alleged e-mails, and had learned of that investigation too late for use in their appeal to the 11th Circuit Court. The 11th Circuit discounted jury misconduct claims in their ruling on Siegelman's appeal.
As noted by Kos in an earlier posts, Siegelman was "prosecuted by corrupt prosecutors on charges trumped up by Karl Rove and his pals. That will hopefully be the next case tossed by the grownups back in charge at Justice."
It appears that Siegelman may well get his conviction tossed by "grownups back in charge at Justice."