Bonusgate witness says ex-counsel tried cover-up
Brett Feese staged a meeting as the scandal broke, the party's former tech chief said.
HARRISBURG - The onetime technology chief for the state House Republicans testified Thursday at a corruption trial that the GOP's former chief counsel, Brett Feese, staged a meeting in an attempt to cover up his knowledge of illegal electioneering.
Tony Painter, who served as the House Republican caucus' director of information and technology from 1994 to 2007, said Feese - a former state representative from Lycoming County and one of two defendants - approached him about replacing the caucus e-mail system in February 2007. That was shortly after the GOP lost control of the House and Feese became the caucus' lawyer.
Painter said he was stunned when Feese told him legislative and campaign activities must be kept separate. He said Feese, who had previously served as House GOP whip and head of the party's House campaign committee, knew that tapping public funds for political purposes had become routine among caucus leaders.
"It was a phony meeting" designed to make Feese appear innocent, Painter testified. "Within three or four days of this meeting, it's business as usual."
Feese's lawyer, Joshua Lock, declined to comment about Painter's testimony and was expected to cross-examine him on Friday.
The meeting Painter described was held around the same time that news reports about legislative leaders paying bonuses to aides prompted the so-called Bonusgate investigation by the state Attorney General's Office into misuse of public money for political purposes. The long-running probe and its offshoots have thus far resulted in criminal charges against 25 current or former House members and aides from both parties.
Painter, who left state government in 2007 and works as a consultant, is one of several people testifying for the prosecution in exchange for immunity from prosecution.
Feese, 57, and his codefendant and former aide Jill Seaman, 59, face multiple counts of theft, conspiracy, and conflict of interest for their alleged roles in a scheme to spend millions in state money on consultants and technology to help elect House GOP candidates.
They also are charged with hindering apprehension and obstruction for allegedly creating handwritten notes, purportedly from meetings Feese had with caucus employees and vendors in 2007 and 2008, to make investigators think Feese was not involved in the misuse of money.
Former House Speaker John M. Perzel of Philadelphia, alleged ringleader of the larger conspiracy, is one of seven people formerly connected to the caucus who have pleaded guilty. Perzel's longtime chief of staff, Philadelphia lawyer Brian Preski, had been a defendant in the trial until Wednesday, when he abruptly pleaded guilty to 10 criminal counts.