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Anderson's attorney discusses trial

by Jill Burke
Tuesday, July 10, 2007

ANCHORAGE, Alaska -- Paul Stockler, the lawyer who represented former Rep. Tom Anderson in his federal corruption trial, said a loss like yesterday's is not something a client or an attorney gets over quickly.

Stockler said he believed they had a good chance of winning at least some of the counts, especially the conspiracy charge.

Stockler said he had prepared Anderson that if a guilty verdict came in on that charge, the first count in the indictment, it would be a bad omen for the rest to come.

It was sound advice.

"My biggest fear going in was the tapes - I thought this case was 90 percent about the tapes and how the jury perceived those conversations and those videos. And if they saw them our way, were going to win. And if they didn't see them our way, we were going to lose," Stocker said.

On the day the verdicts came in, jurors had asked to re-hear the very first meeting between Anderson, his co-conspirator, and the government informant.    

According to Stockler, it was the first time the trio discussed the Web site idea, finances and what kind of things Anderson could do to help if hired as a consultant.    

The corruption case centered on the government's assertion that the Web site was bogus and that the so-called consulting contract was just a ruse to hide a bribery scheme.    

In that July 2004 conversation, Anderson tells Frank Prewitt, when asked, what he can do for them.    

He listed several ways he could help, which in the eyes of Stockler, were a list of job qualifications. But the first item Anderson pointed out in the taped conversation was his status and credibility as an elected official.

Stockler thinks that didn't sit well with the jury.

"The jury took his comment about being a legislator as exactly as how the government saw it -- that he was a legislator trying to sell his votes. So, we both saw that conversation in two different ways," Stockler said.

In the same recorded conversation, Anderson tells Prewitt that if he were to ever vote in ways favorable to Prewitt's interests, it would be because of a shared philosophy and not because of any consulting arrangement.    

Jurors obviously felt more was going on.

The jurors did not see all of the evidence in the sense they didn't see all of the materials it appears both sides had access to. There were more recordings and more meetings. But the jury certainly did get to see everything the judge felt was necessary.    

Stockler maintains there are conversations that would have helped Anderson that weren't allowed to be played in court, although Stockler was able to allude to those conversations during some of the proceedings.

Contact Jill Burke at jburke@ktuu.com