The WP today offers a broad overview of the role of Nigerian Vice President Atiku Abubakar in the ongoing investigation of Rep. William Jefferson (D-La). Most of what is in Allan Lengel’s piece has been reported before, but it’s nice to step back and remind ourselves how outrageous this whole thing is:
[A] chauffeur drove Jefferson and his Northern Virginia business partner, Lori Mody, in a Lincoln Town Car down the winding pavement on Sorrel Avenue in Potomac to Abubakar’s 2.3-acre property, partially shrouded by trees and protected by a six-foot-high black wrought-iron fence with gold tips.
Unbeknownst to Jefferson, Mody was wearing an FBI wire, and the chauffeur was an undercover FBI agent.
Jefferson met privately with Abubakar, without Mody, to discuss iGate Inc.’s involvement with a Nigerian partner in a high-tech venture to market Internet and cable television in Nigeria, according to the FBI affidavit.
Mody had invested $3.5 million, and Jefferson had a secret share of her business and of iGate.
Following the meeting on Sorrel Avenue, Jefferson told Mody that the vice president had demanded a cut of the profits. He said they also needed to give him a $500,000 payment “as a motivating factor,” the affidavit said.
On July 30, Mody gave Jefferson a $100,000 bribe to pass on to Abubakar, and shortly after, Jefferson assured her that it had been delivered.
On Aug. 3, FBI agents found $90,000 of the marked FBI bills in Jefferson’s freezer at his Capitol Hill apartment. None of cash had gone to Abubakar, according to the FBI affidavit.
If this were in a movie script, you would roll your eyes.
