Sir Allen Stanford’s alleged $8 billion Ponzi scheme doesn’t only affect his American investors. In the Antiguan election this week, voters chose between the ruling party and the opposition, which welcomed the Texas financier to Antigua twenty years ago. The economy is the central issue in the election, as Antigua’s Stanford International Bank was shut down by Caribbean regulators due to the Stanford fallout.* Prime Minister Baldwin Spencer says his opponent, Lester Bird, tried to “literally give away Antigua and Barbuda to Allen Stanford.” In 2006, Byrd used his power as a former Prime Minister to nominate Stanford for a knighthood.* Election results are expected today. (Associated Press)
Sam Zell, the chairman and CEO of the newspaper conglomerate Tribune Co. hired a high-profile lawyer to represent him in an interview with the U.S. Attorney’s office about possible connections to former governor Rod Blagojevich, the company said Wednesday. Zell’s lawyer, Anton Valukas, specializes in white collar crime and has represented law firm Jenner & Block in a number of major cases. Among other charges, federal prosecutors have accused Blagojevich and his chief of staff John Harris of threatening to withhold public support from the sale of Wrigley Field, which is owned by Tribune Co., if the company did not fire members of the Chicago Tribune editorial board. (Chicago Tribune)
A report released by the Government Accountability Office today says Medicare home services spending increased 44 percent over five years due partially to fraud and abuse. Medicare home care services include visits by nurses and physical therapists for Medicare patients. Some lawmakers say that lax oversight enabled providers to take advantage of the system to bill for services they did not provide. Chuck Grassley, the top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, harshly criticized Medicare oversight as it currently stands. “There’s no excuse for Medicare officials neglecting payment problems,” the Iowa senator told USA Today. The GAO report recommends implementing criminal background checks on home services providers to reduce cases of fraud. (USA Today)
Easy like Sunday morning? Well, not for Gary Skoien, the former chairman of the Cook County, Illinois GOP. A police report alleges that after his wife caught Skoien with two prostitutes Sunday morning, he had her arrested on domestic violence charges. Skoien says that his wife, a 5-foot-4, 110 pound 36 year-old, beat him with her fists and an electric guitar. “I called the police because I thought I was going to be killed,” he said in the police report. Skoien says that he was with “a friend,” and that he will sue to separate his wife from any contact with him or their three children. (Chicago Sun Times)
Reports in two Alabama papers suggest that a federal investigation into Alabama Attorney General Troy King could be underway. According to the Montgomery Independent, current court logs show sign-in logs which indicated that former employees of the Attorney General’s office appeared before a federal grand jury. Jerry Plott, a former City Councilman from Tuscaloosa, told The Birmingham News that the possible probe could concern King’s alleged investigation into Plott at the request of a King supporter seeking to use public funds for a shopping devleopment, a plan Plott opposed. King denies wrongdoing and claims that he first heard of the alleged investigation from newspaper reports. (Associated Press)
A sting operation near Buffalo, New York exposed a tax preparer accused of helping clients commit tax fraud, according to the state Department of Taxation and Finance. Dara Lis, president of DL Tax and Accounting Services, was arrested Thursday for allegedly offering false state and federal income returns to an undercover Tax Department investigator. According to the agent’s account of the interaction, Lis advised him to lower his reported income so that he would owe the government less in taxes. “As long as there’s no way for them to trace this income, you know, I would just lower it,” Lis reportedly told the agent. (The Buffalo News)
*This sentence was corrected from an earlier version
