[StBernard] article by clancy dubos

[Westley Annis]

The feds have arrested St. Bernard District Judge Wayne Cresap on charges of
conspiracy to commit wire fraud. He was arrested late Friday and transported
to the federal wing of Orleans Parish Prison, sources say (think: Jefferson
Parish District Judge Ronald Bodenheimer). U.S. Attorney Jim Letten has
confirmed only that the case involves attorneys, bribes and bond reductions.
I have a feeling this is just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. The case
has been under investigation for a while - and remains ongoing.

 

Cresap is wired big-time into the prevailing St. Bernard Parish power
structure. He is pals with all the entrenched political players, and if he
rolls, we may see some big names come tumbling down. My sources describe
Cresap as someone unlikely to withstand the kind of pressure that the feds
can put on somebody they want to turn. "He'll sing like a canary," one
source says, "if he's not doing that already." Suffice it to say that
sphincters are raging in Da Parish this weekend.

 

The timing of this case is interesting. When the feds want to sweat someone,
they often arrest him late on a Friday afternoon, as was done here. That
way, the perp gets rolled into the federal wing of OPP after the last
federal magistrate has gone home for the weekend, which means he will spend
a weekend from hell as the guest of Sheriff Marlin Gusman (no reflection of
the sheriff, but I can't imagine a weekend in OPP being anything but hell).
By the time he gets his constitutionally guaranteed appearance in front of a
magistrate on Monday morning, he'll be a basket case. Think the feds might
ask him between now and then if he wants to talk about any of his friends in
St. Bernard? Hmmm.

 

My sources say this case started long ago - more than a year, maybe two
years or more. If that's the case, the case against Cresap (in typical
federal fashion) will be tighter than a gnat's behind. And that means his
only chance to avoid doing big time in the pokey is to roll over on his
(former) pals in St. Bernard.

 

Let's also note that at least two attorneys in St. Bernard are involved.
They are described in the FBI's
<http://blog.nola.com/news_impact/2009/04/wayne%20cresap.pdf> supporting
affidavit as "Lawyer A" and "Attorney B." My sources say it's likely that
both attorneys are already cooperating. In a close-knit, insular political
culture such as St. Bernard's, that increases the likelihood of somebody
rolling over on somebody farther up the political food chain. It could pull
back the curtain on lots of political and financial shenanigans in Da
Parish, not just a judge getting kickbacks from a pair of lawyers.

 

Meanwhile, take a closer look at the affidavit linked above. It notes in
Paragraph 3 that Special Agent Todd A. Goodson, is "not setting forth each
and every fact known to me concerning this investigation. I am including
what I believe are facts sufficient to establish probable cause for the
complaint sought." Translation: There's probably a lot more to this. Cresap
is just the tip of the iceberg.

 

Now let's look even closer at the affidavit. Forgive me for being an editor
(can't help it), but Paragraph 4 of the document sets forth details of how
Cresap allegedly converted standard commercial ("paid") bonds to "personal
surety" ("free") bonds at the request of Lawyer A, who allegedly would then
collect attorney fees from friends or family of the perps seeking the free
bonds and split the fees with Cresap. It's a garden-variety bribery and
kickback scheme. The next paragraph is numbered "6" (there is no Paragraph
5) and states that Cresap was interviewed by other FBI agents on April 9 -
15 days before his arrest on Friday - in a public parking lot (the parking
lot of the St. Bernard Courthouse, mayhaps?), where Cresap "admitted that he
committed the acts described in Paragraph 5 of this affidavit." Okay, maybe
it's just a typo that there's no Paragraph 5, or maybe there was a Paragraph
5 that got cut and Paragraph 6 did not get renumbered. Like I said, I can't
help being an editor - and I'm not suggesting any problems with the case -
but it makes me go "hmmm" when I see stuff like that. Equally interesting,
Paragraph 6 goes on to state that Cresap "admitted that he accepted the
money in exchange for converting the bonds on numerous occasions. The
defendant also admitted that he had a similar arrangement with another
attorney, Attorney 'B.'"

 

My guess is the affidavit simply contains a typo and that there's no missing
Paragraph 5. I say this because all the relevant information referenced in
Paragraph six is contained in Paragraph 4, and somehow the paragraphs just
got mis-numbered after 4. Probably no big deal. What is a big deal is that
Cresap admitted to doing this on numerous occasions with at least two
lawyers. It's also significant that he admitted this to two FBI agents in a
public parking lot 15 days before his arrest, and then suddenly, after those
15 days, he gets picked up and put away for the weekend. Might word have
leaked out that he was talking to the feds? Again, it makes me go "hmmm."

 

At this point, there are only two possibilities with regard to how much
bigger this case gets:  Either this is an isolated case and Cresap is the
only one with unclean hands (along with Lawyer A and Attorney B), or this is
the beginning of the St. Bernard version of Operation Wrinkled Robe.

 

My money says it gets bigger. Like I said, sphincters are raging in da
parish dese days.



 
<http://blogofneworleans.com/blog/2009/04/25/sphincters-raging-in-da-parish/