NYT: (Dem Party) Fund-Raiser Is Sentenced to Two Years in a Payoff Case

[truthpusher]

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/28/nyregion/28newark.html?oref=login

Fund-Raiser Is Sentenced to Two Years in a Payoff Case
By RONALD SMOTHERS

Published: January 28, 2005

NEWARK, Jan. 27 - A businessman and fund-raiser for the Democratic Party in New Jersey was sentenced on Thursday to two years in prison for extorting $40,000 in political donations and cash from a landowner in exchange for promising to help in a dispute with government officials over the land.

The fund-raiser, David M. D'Amiano, 45, of Carteret, who owns a wood recycling and mulching business, pleaded guilty to the federal charges in September in a plea agreement with the United States attorney in a case that roiled New Jersey politics last year and at first appeared to implicate Gov. James E. McGreevey.

The case evolved from an undercover F.B.I. investigation into political corruption in which agents secretly taped a conversation between Mark Halper, a Middlesex County landowner cooperating with investigators, and Mr. McGreevey.

Mr. D'Amiano, a longtime acquaintance of Mr. McGreevey's, arranged for the two men to meet at a political fund-raiser. During their conversation, Mr. McGreevey uttered the word "Machiavelli," which prosecutors contended was a code word arranged by Mr. D'Amiano and intended to assure Mr. Halper that his $40,000 contribution to the Democratic Party would win him preferential treatment in the dispute over his land.

more:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/28/nyregion/28newark.html?oref=login

[Poppyseedman]

1. $40,000 in extortion money in N.J.

is chump change. :)

New Jersey politically is the most corrupt state in the union.

[Dover]

2. Oh pleeeze...........they could fill a prison with GOP illegal fundraisers

And Delay should be first in line.