Deliberations continue in Edwards’ corruption trial

Melinda DeSlatte

Monday, Oct. 9, 2000 | 4:22 a.m.

BATON ROUGE, La. - As jurors spent a second day considering a corruption case against former Gov. Edwin Edwards and Insurance Commissioner Jim Brown, the top prosecutor in the case said he is not worried by the lack of a quick resolution.

"It's hard to read anything into it," U.S. Attorney Eddie Jordan of New Orleans said Monday. "It usually indicates they're thinking very hard about the case."

Edwards, 73, already appealing a May 9 conviction in an unrelated case, awaited a verdict with Brown, 60, and Shreveport attorney Ronald Weems, 55. Prosecutors accused them of creating a sweetheart settlement for the owner of the failed Cascade Insurance Co. in 1996, several months after Edwards' final term ended.

Cascade owner David Disiere wound up settling with the state for $2.5 million. Prosecutors said he should have been forced to pay millions more to the state for reimbursement of Cascade's creditors.

Each man faced 43 counts of insurance, mail and wire fraud, witness tampering and conspiracy. Brown and Weems also were charged with additional counts of lying to federal authorities.

When maximum sentences are added up, the total for Edwards in the event of conviction on all counts is 230 years and $12 million in fines. Brown and Weems each faced the same, plus additional years and fines for their alleged lies. However, federal sentencing guidelines and the possibility of concurrent, rather than consecutive, prison terms made such severe sentences unlikely.

Trial began Sept. 18. The nearly all-female jury received the case Friday and spent six hours in deliberations before breaking for the weekend.

Edwards, who spent four terms as governor (1972-76, 1976-80, 1984-88 and 1992-1996) was convicted May 9 of racketeering on charges stemming from the licensing of riverboat casinos before and after his final term. He has not been sentenced.

In the Cascade case, the prosecution centered on secretly recorded tapes from wiretaps on Edwards' home telephone and a microphone in his law office.

On the tapes, Edwards, Brown, Weems and others are heard discussing the insurance company and possible settlements. Prosecutors claimed the tapes prove an illegally concocted settlement; defense lawyers argued the opposite, that the tapes indicate the negotiations were lengthy and legal.

The star witness in the government's case was Foster "Foxy" Sanders, who was a state judge in 1996 and oversaw the receivership office that liquidated failed insurance companies.

Sanders said Edwards bribed him by offering to use his influence to clear Sanders in an unrelated federal investigation.

Edwards and Weems, both attorneys, benefitted from the settlement because Disiere was their client, prosecutors claimed. They said Brown joined in the scheme hoping Sanders would give him control of the receivership office.

Sanders was one of three men who pleaded guilty in the case. He testified as part of a plea agreement, a fact defense attorneys repeatedly warned the jurors should prompt the questioning of his honesty.