AP: Texas

11/09/2005

By APRIL CASTRO  / Associated Press

State District Judge Bob Perkins voluntarily stepped aside Wednesday from the cases of two of U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay's co-defendants, a week after another judge removed him from the trial of the former House majority leader.

DeLay, charged with money laundering and conspiracy, objected to Perkins hearing the case because the judge contributed to Democrats in the past, including the group Moveon.org, which waged a "Fire DeLay" campaign after DeLay was admonished by the House ethics committee.

Also Wednesday, DeLay attorney Dick DeGuerin reasserted a previous claim that the charges should be dropped because part of the law on which they are based didn't exist when the transactions in question occurred. Defense attorneys contend that prosecutor Ronnie Earle circumvented state election code — under which he has no authority to indict DeLay — in order to charge the men with violating the state penal code.

Semiretired San Antonio Judge Pat Priest was appointed to oversee the case. He has set a Nov. 22 meeting for DeLay and Republican fundraisers Jim Ellis and John Colyandro, all charged with criminal conspiracy and money laundering, violations of the state penal code.

The meeting will likely be used to "sort out where things are," said Ellis attorney J.D. Pauerstein. He doesn't expect Priest to take up substantive motions, such as the request to move the trial to Fort Bend County, at that meeting.

The three are accused of orchestrating a scheme that routed corporate donations through DeLay's Texas political action committee to the national Republican party, which then returned nearly the same amount back to seven Texas House candidates. Use of corporate donations for direct campaign expenditures is illegal in Texas.

DeGuerin also filed a brief with the court to bolster the defense argument for moving DeLay's trial to Fort Bend County, DeLay's GOP-dominated home county.

Judges in Texas are elected and are free to contribute to candidates and political parties. But DeLay's legal team argued Perkins couldn't fairly preside over a trial for someone with whom he was so obviously politically opposed.