LegiStorm: Transparency's Sidekick

Once again, an Alaskan legislator is in hot water over allegedly receiving gifts that were not listed on his financial disclosure forms.

Court documents filed leading up to the sentencing of Bill Allen allege that Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) received as much as $200,000 over a period of 13 years, the Associated Press reported this weekend. Allen and his oil company VECO Corp. were central figures in former Alaska Sen. Ted Steven's (R) corruption trial.

The court filing says Young received as much as $15,000 a year from VECO to pay for the congressman's annual pig roast fundraiser from 1993 to 2006. It also alleges that VECO vice president Rick Smith used Allen's credit card to buy a $1,000 set of golf clubs for Young.

Most personal financial disclosures by members of Congress won't be released to the public until next month, but some interesting disclosures have already trickled out so far.

Take Norm Coleman. The Republican from Minnesota refuses to concede to challenger Al Franken in his apparent Senate re-election defeat, but his financial disclosure is a concession of sorts. Instead of filing an annual disclosure typical of any member of Congress staying in office, in April he filed a termination report along with all other departing members.

One of the latest filings released was for Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), who filed his termination report with the Senate this month. As the Associated Press reported today,  Stevens disclosed a debt of between $1 million and $5 million in legal fees to Williams and Connolly LLP, the firm that represented Stevens in his corruption case regarding past omissions on disclosure forms. A jury found Stevens guilty last fall before Stevens was defeated in his reelection campaign, but the case was dismissed in April after a judge found prosecutors withheld evidence from the defense.

Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) was convicted on seven counts of making false statements on his personal financial disclosures today. Stevens failed to disclose gifts, including free home renovations, and his failure to disclose led to his conviction and may cost him his Senate seat with elections a week away.

The charges related to Stevens' personal financial disclosures from 2002-2007, all of which are available to view on LegiStorm. The original indictment, including a description of all seven charges, is also available on LegiStorm.

Steven's case underscores the importance of disclosure in government, and also the importance of making those disclosure forms widely and easily available for public viewing, in case there are discrepancies to be found.

With his indictment today, the powerful and cantankerous Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) is finding that it's often not the underlying deed that proves your undoing but the coverup.

Stevens would probably have been in a heap of legal trouble for taking more than $250,000 in gifts from a contractor in the form of home renovations and household goods. But it's the failure to report these gifts on his personal financial disclosures that makes it such an easy case for federal prosecutors, who just unveiled a seven-count indictment against the senior senator for making false statements.

There's no need for prosecutors to prove a quid pro quo. All they need to show is that Stevens took the gifts, knew he was taking gifts and that he knowingly failed to report it.