Federal grand jury issues subpoena for Buckham (DeLay's chief of staff) payroll records

[babylonsister]

http://www.politico.com/blogs/thecrypt/0907/Federal_grand_jury_issues_subpoena_for_Buckham_records.html

Federal grand jury issues subpoena for Buckham payroll records

A federal grand jury has subpoenaed payroll records from the House for Ed Buckham, former chief of staff to ex-House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas).

The subpoena, issued by a grand jury in Washington, D.C., is the first formal notification that Buckham is the focus of a federal corruption probe. The subpoena was sent to Daniel Beard, chief administrative officer for the House, and formally read into the Congressional Record this afternoon, although Buckham was not mentioned in the official notification.

Buckham served as DeLay's chief of staff before leaving to become a lobbyist. He had extensive dealings with now imprisoned GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff, and a former buiness associate Tony Rudy - also a former DeLay aide - has already pleaded guilty to accepting payments from Abramoff's clients while working for DeLay. The gifts, including payments to Rudy's wife, were in exchange for helping Abramoff and his clients with legislative matters.

Buckham remained very close to DeLay after he left the Texas Republican's staff, advising DeLay on numerous political and legislative matters.

In recent months, a number of ex-DeLay staffers have been subpoenaed - or voluntarily came in for questioning - by the Justice Dept. to discuss the day-to-day operations of DeLay's office, including the role Buckham played once he left DeLay's staff, according to sources familiar with the investigation.

DeLay and Buckham have repeatedly denied any wrongdoing, although a number of former associates have pleaded guilty to corruption charges as a result of the Abramoff probe.

I will update this as soon as possible.

[eppur_se_muova]

1. Grind on, wheels of justice.

Repugs are to corruption as moths are to flames.

[BrotherBuzz]

2. Doolittle has some stink in this pile, too.

Buckham also has ties to other lawmakers under federal investigation, including Rep. John Doolittle (R-Calif.). Buckham's lobbying firm hired Doolittle's wife, Julie Doolittle, to do consulting work. Doolittle's house was recently raided by FBI agents as part of the continuing Abramoff investigation.

Julie Doolittle was working at Buckham's offices in 2002 when Buckham introduced Brent Wilkes to her husband. Oh, Edwin Buckham also employed Christine DeLay, too. Small circle of friends, these thieves are.

[sonias]

3. Sweet!

Nothing makes my day better than hearing Tom DeLay is getting closer to serving jail time. We all know in our hearts that bastard is guilty of lots of things, just like Karl Rove. You just have to keep digging through the manure to get to the truth and then make sure the "rule of law" gets applied to his fifthly, lying, cheating, hypocrite ass!



Sonia

[babylonsister]

4. We've been waiting a long time to hear some 'good' news about da bugman.

Bring it on! :toast: