Candy Man: Ex-senator Phil Griegos path to a sweet $51,389.07 payday could land him in prison
If anyone besides Phil Griego's wife, Jane, were actually attending his trial on eight public corruption charges with any regularity, they could be forgiven for thinking there were two different court cases going on in the windowless courtroom on the third floor of the First District Courthouse in Santa Fe.
To hear state prosecutors with the state Attorney General's Office tell it, Griego used his position as senator to grease connections and engineer the sale of a state-owned building that would land him an outsized payday as a real estate broker. Despite having had ample opportunity to correct erroneous information about the sale, disclose his potential windfall to his legislative colleagues and let them vote on the facts, prosecutors say, Griego kept it quiet.
Listening to the opening statement and cross examinations of his defense attorneys, though, Phil Griego acted just as anyone else would. He didn't try to throw his weight around as a senator and quietly went about his business as the legislation to authorize the sale sailed through the state house.
The witness lists submitted to the court in the weeks before the trial share eight names. There's little dispute over the chain of events. Griego doesn't deny asking staff to draft legislation for the sale. He doesn't deny going to hearings or standing quietly by as Sen. Carlos Cisneros told his colleagues, incorrectly as it would later come to be known, that the building was a financial drain on the state. He doesn't deny religiously following up on a piece of legislation that he didn't carry. What does deny is that there's anything wrong with it.
Read more: http://www.sfreporter.com/news/coverstories/2017/11/08/candy-man-2/