Friend turns on Sen. Stevens in gift-giving trial

[spinbaby]

Source: AP

WASHINGTON - A longtime friend of Sen. Ted Stevens has taken the stand as the star witness in the Alaska Republican's corruption trial. Wealthy oil contractor Bill Allen once was a trusted confidant of the senator. Now he's working with the Justice Department. The former friends barely looked at each other as Allen took the stand Tuesday in federal court in Washington.

Allen is expected to testify that his company, VECO Corp., performed more than $250,000 in free renovations on Stevens' home in Alaska. Stevens allegedly concealed that on Senate documents.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080930/ap_on_go_ot/stevens_trial

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Couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

[Cooley Hurd]

1. Ultimately, even friendship is...

...a series of tubes... lonely tubes.:D

[Maraya1969]

5. Connected by the occasional joint.

[Psephos]

2. Maybe there is a God after all.... n/t

[maddezmom]

3. good news

K&R

[ScaryBob]

4. As the old Monty Python skit once said...

ti-MING is everything. And I'm praying to the FSM that he is convicted before November 4th.

[JNelson6563]

6. The good news re: Stevens never ends.

K&R

[underpants]

7. Maybe its time for the Hulk tie

for reasons unexplainable that works in the US Senate

:eyes:

[gratuitous]

8. Jail time on the line . . .

And these corrupt bastards turn on each other like a nest of poisonous vipers. I wonder if the maelstrom will suck in any other public servants in Alaska. Like, maybe, the governor? Nah, Stevens wouldn't do that just to save his own miserable skin, would he?

[yellowcanine]

9. He better watch his back on the internet tubes. Someone could hide in a side tube and jump him when

he goes by.

[spinbaby]

10. Hot off the presses

Witness says he never billed Ted Stevens for renovations

WASHINGTON -- An Alaskan oilman at the center of corruption charges against Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) said Wednesday that he helped engineer an overhaul of Stevens' ski chalet but never billed the lawmaker for the work.

Bill J. Allen, the star prosecution witness at Stevens' federal court trial, said he received a handwritten letter from the senator in 2002 in which Stevens requested a bill. But he testified that he ignored the request after a discussion with a mutual friend overseeing the work.

"He said, 'Ah, Bill, don't worry about getting a bill,' " Allen said in testimony Wednesday, recounting a conversation with the friend, Bob Persons, who owns a popular restaurant in Girdwood, where the Stevens' home is located.

Allen, 71, testified Wednesday about how workers from his now-defunct oilfield services firm, VECO Corp., performed plumbing, electrical, lighting and other services on the makeover of the Stevens' home.


http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-stevens2-2008oct02,0,3243665.story

[brooklynite]

11. Here are the juicy details...

from CQ Politics:

The marquee witness in the government’s federal corruption case against Sen. Ted Stevens testified Wednesday that he never billed the senator for any of the labor or materials associated with a massive renovation — and a series of smaller upgrades — that his company made to the Alaska Republican’s chalet in Girdwood, Alaska.

Bill Allen, once a close, personal friend of Stevens and the chief executive of oil-services company VECO Corp, testified that VECO and its employees spearheaded the addition of a new first floor to what was then a basic A-frame cabin, as well as a number of supplemental upgrades, including the addition of first and second-floor decks, a garage, a new kitchen and a rooftop snow-melting system.

Allen testified he never sent Stevens a bill for the work — despite a written request for a bill from Stevens in 2002 — because another Stevens confidant advised him that he shouldn’t bill Stevens.

“Ted’s just covering his ass,” Allen told the court that the other friend, Girdwood restaurateur Bob Persons, told him.

C'mon; who doesn't get a few freebies when having work done on their chalet.