U.S. Congressman Chaka Fattah and four associates have been indicted on 29-counts for participating in a racketeering conspiracy and other crimes intended to serve their political and financial interests.
Such schemes include bribery, conspiracy to commit mail, wire and honest services fraud, and multiple counts of mail fraud, falsification of records, bank fraud, making false statements to a financial institution and money laundering.
Apart from Fattah, lobbyist Herbert Vederman, 69, Fattah's Congressional District Director Bonnie Bowser, 59, Robert Brand, 69, and Karen Nicholas, 57, were charged in the case, reports The Legal Intelligencer.
Assistant Attorney General Leslie R. Caldwell revealed the decision on Wednesday with members of the FBI and Internal Revenue Service-Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI).
"As charged in the indictment, Congressman Fattah and his associates embarked on a wide-ranging conspiracy involving bribery, concealment of unlawful campaign contributions and theft of charitable and federal funds to advance their own personal interests," Caldwell said. "When elected officials betray the trust and confidence placed in them by the public, the department will do everything we can to ensure that they are held accountable. Public corruption takes a particularly heavy toll on our democracy because it undermines people's basic belief that our elected leaders are committed to serving the public interest, not to lining their own pockets."
"The public expects their elected officials to act with honesty and integrity," U.S. attorney Zane David Memeger said in a statement released by the Department of Justice. "By misusing campaign funds, misappropriating government funds, accepting bribes, and committing bank fraud, as alleged in the Indictment, Congressman Fattah and his co-conspirators have betrayed the public trust and undermined faith in government."
Fattah denied any wrongdoing and said he plans to keep working in Congress. according to The Wall Street Journal.
"I've never been involved in any wrongdoing; any unlawful activity; any misappropriation of federal funds,'' he said. "It's obviously going to be important to my constituents that this matter not be a distraction in terms of my work and I'm going to try not to have it be a distraction,"
