Firm Tied to Convict Aided Rep. Cunningham

[SHRED]

Firm Tied to Convict Aided Rep. Cunningham

By SETH HETTENA
The Associated Press
Saturday, July 9, 2005; 12:08 AM

SAN DIEGO -- A company linked to a New York businessman who was convicted in a bid-rigging scheme helped Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham finance his Arlington, Va., condominium, court records show.

Coastal Capital financed the $150,000 mortgage on Cunningham's two-bedroom condominium, according to records on file with the Arlington, Va., Circuit Court. In 2003, Coastal Capital financed $1.1 million in mortgages toward the purchase of Cunningham's seven-bath home in Rancho Santa Fe.

Coastal Capital is run by the nephew and daughter of Thomas T. Kontogiannis, a Long Island developer who pleaded guilty in October 2002 in a bid-rigging, bribe and kickback scheme involving New York City school computer contracts worth millions of dollars.

Cunningham's attorney, K. Lee Blalack, declined to comment Friday on the condo sale. Earlier this week, Blalack said "Duke's business dealings with Mr. Kontogiannis have been entirely proper."

>>>>>>>>>>>>> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/08/AR2005070801536.html

[MisterP]

1. Randy "Duke" can't be not-corrupt for even six hours!

[bahrbearian]

4. Hes never even smoked a mar juana cigarette

He just uses a Bong.

[mbperrin]

2. NO! Crooked businessmen linked to crooked politicos??!!

Say it ain't so! Next thing they'll be claiming is that business people have to pay to get Tom Delay to help them!!

[The Magistrate]

3. It Seems, Sir

To be a core Republican conviction that thievery is a virtue....

[seafan]

5. School computer contracts.... reminds me of Neil Bush's Ignite somehow...

Nah. I'm just overimaginative.

[havocmom]

6. Somebody puleeze take the shovel out of Cunningham's hand!

If he digs that hole any deeper he will probably enter a nation on the other side of the globe and start an international incident!

[SHRED]

7. Lol!!

:rofl: :spray:

[habitual]

8. Look up corruption in the dictionary

and you'll find the bush administration.

Look up "Busted For Corruption" and you'll find Cunningham.

[Rose Siding]

9. The guy he bought the condo from has a....*colorful* story too.

Josh Marshall hunted this down...

snip>
According to this August 2003 Department of Labor bulletin, Della Ratta and a colleague got nailed for raiding an ERISA asset management plan of which they served as trustees. In July 2003, says the bulletin, a federal court "appointed an independent fiduciary to distribute all remaining plan assets of the profit sharing plans of Della Ratta, Inc. and Commercial Management Company in Silver Spring, Maryland. The court further ordered restoration of more than $166,000 to the plans from assets held in a Della Ratta, Inc. corporate account and restitution to be paid by the plans’ trustees."

Said Labor Secretary Elaine Chao of the case: "Corporations and executives who are designated retirement plan fiduciaries have a responsibility to protect the pension assets of its participants. These defendants used the plan assets for their personal gain. The department's action recovers pension assets taken illegally from the workers and their families.”

Della Ratta and his colleague Joseph E. Brimmer were ordered to pay back the money, removed as trustees of the plan in question and barred from ever again overseeing any other plans governed by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act.

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