CINCINNATI (AP) — A former county official’s conviction and
28-year sentence in a wide-ranging public corruption case were upheld
Wednesday by a federal appeals court.
The 6th U.S. Circuit Court
of Appeals in Cincinnati affirmed former Cuyahoga County Commissioner
Jimmy Dimora’s 2012 conviction and sentence on 32 bribery-related
offenses.
Dimora had asked the court to drop four charges and
grant a new trial on the remaining ones. His attorney argued the trial
judge should have allowed jurors to see ethics reports the attorney said
would have proven the items that Dimora received were gifts and not
bribes.
Prosecutors had argued the reports were incomplete and
described only relationships with people who were bribing Dimora, not
details or dollar figures.
The three-judge appeals panel found the
trial judge erred in ruling that the reports were inadmissible hearsay,
but it said any error was harmless because "the government produced
overwhelming evidence against Dimora."
The panel ruled that the
ethics reports would have done little to tip the scales against that
evidence and their admission would have hurt Dimora by "opening the door
to other evidence that would have done him no favors."
Dimora’s attorney, Christian Grostic, didn’t immediately return calls for comment Wednesday.
The
investigation that led to the 37-day trial of the former Democratic
Party chairman in Cleveland resulted in more than 50 convictions
involving county officials, employees and contractors who prosecutors
say traded bribes for government jobs and contracts.
Assistant
U.S. Attorneys Antoinette Bacon and Ann Rowland said in an emailed
statement Wednesday that the appeals court ruling confirmed that Dimora
received a fair trial and that the jury’s verdict was supported by
overwhelming evidence of greed and corruption.
Wednesday’s ruling
noted that the FBI investigation into public corruption in Cuyahoga
County that began in 2007 showed Dimora handed out public jobs,
influenced Cleveland decision-makers and steered public contracts in
return for approximately 100 bribes worth more than $250,000.
The
government had said Dimora took bribes for nearly a decade, including a
Las Vegas trip that involved a woman who was paid $1,000 to give him a
massage in his hotel room. Other bribes included home renovations,
high-end restaurant meals, limousine service and use of a condominium,
the indictment said.
Dimora angrily denied wrongdoing and had invited FBI agents to come after him before he was indicted.
A tearful Dimora said at his July 2012 sentencing hearing that everything he did was for the good of the
county’s taxpayers.
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