VERDICT: Noe guilty of 29 felony counts

[BillORightsMan]

By MIKE WILKINSON and STEVE EDER
BLADE STAFF WRITERS

Monday, November 13, 2006

Noe was found guilty of 29 of 40 charges, including theft, corrupt activity, money laundering, forging records and tampering with documents. He was convicted on the chief charge that he engaged in a pattern of corruption in his management of Ohio's $50 million rare-coin fund investment with the bureau.

The corrupt activity charge was the most serious, carrying a minimum mandatory 10-year prison sentence.

The maximum sentence, if imposed on all counts, would total 72 years in prison. Prosecutors said it was unlikely the judge would order such a lengthy sentence.

~SNIP~
Sentencing will be Nov. 20.

I wonder how much of Noe's ill-gotten gain (houses, cars, etc) will be part of the sentence.

CONVICTIONS:

• ENGAGING IN A PATTERN OF CORRUPT ACTIVITY: One count, mandatory 10-year sentence.
  
• MONEY LAUNDERING: Four counts, 1-5 years on each count.
  
• TAMPERING WITH RECORDS: Four counts, 1-5 years on each count.
  
• FORGERY: 18 counts, six months to one year on each count.
  

EIGHTEEN COUNTS OF FORGERY???
More info at The Toledo Blade...

:patriot:

Schadenfreude, anyone?

[rexcat]

1. Noe has been a major contributor to republicans in Ohio...

for years. Those who have taken money from him need to be exposed.

[Sturmrabe]

6. I hope so

There needs to be a laundry list of people he's contributed to

[POAS]

2. Using the minimums he gets 27 years

[Kolesar]

3. It's not so bad in minimum security...I hear they get conjugal visits

:nopity:

[Kolesar]

4. Gratuitous "Noe led away in handcuffs" pic, courtesy of the GOPee Dee

[mtnester]

5. Kinda like Gary Demastry's twin...

[MeDeMax]

7. in the interests of the public...NOE should be allowed

to plea bargain for a light sentence, in exchange for his entire ill-gotten fortunes
and evidence that nails all the lawmakers and public servants that aided and abetted.

Just putting this one man in jail, for however long, does not rid the system of the
corruption. We have to nip the bud AND snip the roots, imho.

[Earl from Ohio]

8. Prosecutor misconduct

NO this claim that Noe should get off lightly is HOGWASH. The man stole MILLIONS of dollars while breaking both state and federal law. I have personally seen many, MANY criminal defendents do YEARS in state penitenaries for much MUCH less. To argue that he should get off is complete crap.

What SHOULD have happened was that he agreed to testifiy against others in exchange for consideration at sentencing.

You will note that Mr. Noe has not uttered ONE WORD in any court room against anyone else.

NOT ONE EFFING WORD.

Which makes any plea for him to receive a light sentence, just plain ridculous.

Here's what happened:

From the outset, Noe told federal prosecutors that he would plead guilty IF they agreed to keep his wife completely untouched. And basically, Tom was allowed to call the shots.

Problem: his wife was the Lucas County GOP chair and DEEPLY involved in all of these shenanagins.

So, when the feds agreed to not touch Bernadette, it meant that basically, everything would fall on Tom and everyone else would get off... which oddly enough is exactly what happened.

Then the fed prosecutor, a recent GOP candidate for congress (he lost in the primary)gave immunity to ALL of the "conduits" who took money from Noe (which he had stolen from the BWC) and passed to the Bush campaign (and many others). The grant of immunity was for the conduits' testimony before the federal grand jury that indicted Noe.

Problem: their testimony was completely unneeded. It would have been a CINCH to indict Noe based exclusively on the paper trail or the testimony of flunkies.

And, of course, although Noe gave money to many Ohio candidates, there has been NO ACTION AT ALL on the state level.

No, Tom should NOT get a sentence any lighter than what he received (27 months in a ClubFed facility) BUT instead, all of the conduits should have been indicted for federal campaign finance law violations. I PROMISE that would have gotten some of these people to sing like canaries.

What the feds could not give Tom, of course, was immunity from local prosecution. And, of course, the Lucas county prosecutor is a Democrat. Hence, these convictions.

{BTW, I think that the minimum sentence here is closer to ten years, not 27. Ohio judges may impose sentences "concurrently."}

At this point, it is apparent that the GOP's "it's all Tom's fault, and he's just one bad apple" stratergery has succeeded PERFECTLY. By 2008, Ohio voters will have forgotten all about this and the GOP office holders who benefited from Noe's "reverse Robin Hood" operation will have escaped justice. In the meantime, the system of gerrymandering and corruption that gave the GOP ironclad control of the general Assembly is intact, and the many GOP legislative candidates that Noe supported are still in office (yeah- I mean you- Randy and Latta)

Fortunately, Sweaty Betty got her comeuppance- she didn't even carry her home county...

[Kolesar]

9. !

[geiger]

10. Great post, and I agree entirely, except it sounds like Abramoff is still talking

and he says to friends in an email, "things are going to get much worse before they get better."

I say LaTourette is next, and did I see it right yesterday, Boehner out of the R leadership in Washington? I thought he was still acting like he was a shoe-in pending some announcement today, but I distinctly remember one Republican liar introducing Trent Lott as the new "assistant Majority Leader," a fictious position, of course....nevertheless I knew what they were trying to pull, as if they haven't lost the majority....

[geiger]

11. oops, I see now that they had only trotted out their Senate leadership

[BillORightsMan]

12. UPDATE: Noe gets 18 years

Noe is sentenced to 18 years in state prison
By STEVE EDER and MIKE WILKINSON
BLADE STAFF WRITERS
Article published Monday, November 20, 2006

Tom Noe, convicted last week on 29 charges for stealing from Ohio’s $50 million rare-coin fund, was sentenced to 18 years in state prison and ordered to pay fines and restitution by Judge Thomas Osowik this morning in Lucas County Courthouse.

The sentence will begin after Noe completes a 27-month federal sentence imposed in September for illegal laundering more than $45,000 to President Bush’s campaign, Judge Osowik ruled.

Noe was fined $213,000 by Judge Osowik and ordered to pay the cost of the prosecution, estimated at nearly $3 million, and ordered to pay restitution to the Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation for the money missing from the rare-coin fund, estimated at $13.7 million.

“You cooked the books ... it was an elaborate scheme,” Judge Osowik said before sentencing Noe.

more at link...

Yes Earl, he should do the time! And so should all the other crooks. Your post certainly made my blood boil! :grr:

imbillorightsmanandiapprovethismessage