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Lawyers Jockey in Lincoln Park Case

"The government is seeking to limit how far the defense can go to try to undermine the credibility of the former high-ranking executives who blew the whistle on the alleged scheme to make "improper and illegal payment[s]" to the law firm of then-House Speaker John B. Harwood.

"The defense is again seeking to persuade the judge the case is fatally flawed without evidence that Harwood even knew of the alleged scheme to funnel up to $4 million in bribes to him -- and other unnamed public officials -- through his law partner, Daniel V. McKinnon.

"...In a court filing last week, the lawyer for one of the defendants -- Nigel Potter, former chief executive of Lincoln Park's British parent company, Wembley PLC -- blamed the "hyperbole" of another, former Lincoln Park CEO and general manager Daniel Bucci, for the legal predicament the two men are now in.

"...A hearing is scheduled for tomorrow in U.S. District Court on the pretrial motions. They include a bid for separate trials or, in the alternative, an order excluding Bucci's potentially "prejudicial" admission, to FBI agents, that he "verbally offered" McKinnon $1 million.

"...In their own filing, the prosecutors again laid out the thrust of their case: that Potter, Bucci and the corporate entity that owns Lincoln Park concocted a scheme 'to bribe John Harwood and other public officials to gain favor for Lincoln Park.'

"...The government's case rests, in part, on a memo that Bucci sent Sherman in which he expressed his view that Lincoln Park could win the approvals it would need to install another 1,700 video-gambling machines and convert to coin-operated slots 'if there is a reward/incentive component introduced.'..."

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