Adult Entertainment Industry

What bill did the House Rules Committee consider Monday night immediately after rejecting the bipartisan ethics reform proposal? 

Sen. Matt Bartle's anti-porn bill (SB586), legislation almost identical to the legislation at the center of a federal grand jury investigation.

“Clearly, surely, they’ve got something credible that makes them think that there might have been something wrong go on there.”

Rod Jetton on the federal investigation of his handling of a 2005 anti-adult entertainment bill, as quoted in The Star

The Associated Press:

U.S. attorneys are pursuing allegations of bribery, conspiracy and mail fraud as part of an investigation into former Missouri House Speaker Rod Jetton, according to court documents received by a former lawmaker summoned before the grand jury Tuesday.

Former Republican Rep. Bob Johnson, of Lee's Summit, said U.S. attorneys quizzed him about whether he knew of a $35,000 political contribution by the adult entertainment industry, and whether that money played a role in Jetton's decision to assign a 2005 bill regulating sexually oriented businesses to a committee Johnson led.

The same article notes that Jackson County Circuit Judge David Byrn and Chris Benjamin spoke to the grand jury in February. 

Bryrn was treasurer of the Committee for Honest Campaigns PAC that received the $35,000 from the People of Private Enterprise PAC in April 2005. The Star reported in January that Rep. Doug Ervin (R-Kearney) said Don Lograsso "told him that the Committee for Honest Campaigns was organized specifically to discreetly funnel donations that could be politically damaging to fellow Republican candidates."

AP: 

Grand jurors in Kansas City ended a 2-day session Wednesday without any indictments in a pay-for-play probe involving former House Speaker Rod Jetton and legislation regulating the adult entertainment industry. The grand jury is scheduled to meet again March 9.

The Post-Dispatch's Tony Messenger spoke with former Speaker Rod Jetton about the ongoing federal investigation into his actions regarding a 2005 anti-strip club bill.  Jetton says he is "befuddled" as to why the FBI, his fellow Republicans and the public have had a hard time believing his denials that there was any connection between the strip club money and his official actions.

The Associated Press [updated]: 

Republican Sen. Matt Bartle, of Lee's Summit, testified for a little less than an hour Tuesday at the federal courthouse in Kansas City. Bartle says he is not a target of the probe.

The senator told reporters that he believes there is a link between the demise of his 2005 legislation, which never made it to the House floor, and a $35,000 contribution by the adult entertainment industry to a political committee with connections to an adviser for former House Speaker Rod Jetton.

Michael Mahoney has more: 

Bartle would not be specific about his testimony. But he did tell reporters of 2005 anti porn bill he sponsored and how it was killed.

Charles Evans Whittaker Courthouse
in Kansas City

The Star's Steve Kraske:

The water is always cloudy, too, when it comes to federal probes. G-Men don’t talk to us media types.

But given the stakes, and being an inquisitive sort, you press on and talk to people who may or may not have been interviewed by FBI agents. And you eventually come to a conclusion:

Things are about to get very, very interesting.

We know this: The FBI has been extremely active. At least a handful of lawmakers in the state Capitol began talking to agents about a year ago in connection with “pay to play,” or the allegation of special interests forking over campaign contributions in exchange for action on legislation they care about.

The Star has the fascinating story of what happened when Rep. Doug Ervin (R-Kearney) and former Rep. Brian Baker (R-Belton) asked pointed questions about the receipt of strip club contributions by a campaign committee with strong ties to (former?) House Counsel Don Lograsso, and the prompt actions by former Speaker Rod Jetton to make sure anti-strip club legislation went nowhere.

According to Erving and Baker, Jetton blackballed them:

Ervin and Baker said they initially raised questions about the contribution with Jetton and Lograsso in 2005, shortly after the strip club bill was killed in committee.

“They obviously knew who that (campaign) committee represented,” Baker said.

But when they approached Lograsso, Ervin said he dismissed their concerns. Ervin said Lograsso also told him that the Committee for Honest Campaigns was organized specifically to discreetly funnel donations that could be politically damaging to fellow Republican candidates...

Ervin and Baker said that, following a Star story in 2006 about the donation, they held a tense meeting with Jetton and asked Lograsso to address the situation before the entire Republican caucus, which was worried that adult-entertainment money might find its way into their campaigns...

Baker and Ervin...said they were “blackballed” by the speaker’s office until Jetton left the post in early 2009. Baker was stripped of a committee chairmanship and Ervin said he nearly lost his.

House General Counsel Don Lograsso doesn't want to talk about a reported federal inquiry about a 2005 bill regulating strip clubs, but Ron Richard is publicly acknowledging that Lograsso has had "some conversations" about "all that grand-jury-in-Kansas-City-talk.”  The Star:

Lograsso’s job as general counsel to the Republican-led House included advising [then-speaker Rod] Jetton on bill referrals. The campaign committee receiving the $35,000 donation also paid Lograsso for consulting work. Jetton has denied wrongdoing.

Lograsso declined to comment Friday when asked if he’d been contacted by federal authorities. “Is there some part of ‘We’re not going to talk about that’ that you don’t understand?” he said.

Current House Speaker Ron Richard said that he asked Lograsso if he was involved in any of the issues believed to be under scrutiny by the FBI.

“(I asked) is there anything I need to know with all that grand-jury-in-Kansas-City-talk,” Richard recalled. “He said, ‘I’ve had some conversations, but everything’s fine.’ ”

As first alluded to here yesterday, a federal investigation appears to be looking at the alleged pay-to-play leadership of former Speaker Rod Jetton -- especially his role in killing a 2005 bill sponsored by Sen. Matt Bartle (R-Lee's Summit) that tried to crack down on strip clubs. In today's Star:

Former state lawmaker Bob Johnson, a Lee’s Summit Republican, said three FBI agents last week interviewed him about the bill and Jetton’s role.

“No question there’s interest in Rod Jetton,” Johnson told The Kansas City Star. “That’s all they wanted to talk about.”...

The word out of Jefferson City today is that a federal grand jury in the Western District is actively looking at pay-to-play allegations pertaining to a 2005 bill to crack down on the adult entertainment industry.

Current and former officials have apparently been asked to speak to the grand jury in early February.

The adult entertainment legislation at the center of the rumors has long been a point of controversy, and was specifically cited in a Star article just last month as an example of allegedly corrupt behavior in the Capitol. Previous Fired Up! coverage of the legislation may be found here.

Talk of grand jury action is squishy by nature, but we'll post any updates or related information as it's available.

Earlier today, Speaker Rod Jetton sent an email to GOP candidates for the House urging them not to accept contributions from the PAC, People For Private Enterprise, a front-group for the adult entertainment industry in Missouri.

Certain organizations that you may not intend to accept money from might try to contribute to your campaign. Often these groups have ambiguous names that do not clearly indicate the interests of the organization.

This might seem unremarkable, unless you happen to remember that Speaker Jetton's General Counsel is a consultant to a PAC that was used to launder money from People For Private Enterprise and to get that money into the hands of GOP candidates.

From a March 4, 2006 KC Star story on the topic: