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2 Ex-Christie Allies Are Convicted in George Washington Bridge Case 2 Ex-Christie Allies Are Convicted in George Washington Bridge Case
(about 3 hours later)
NEWARK — A federal jury convicted two former aides to Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey on Friday over a bizarre scheme to close access lanes to the George Washington Bridge as punishment against a mayor who declined to endorse the governor’s re-election. NEWARK — A federal jury convicted two former allies of Gov. Chris Christie on Friday of all charges stemming from a bizarre scheme to close access lanes at the George Washington Bridge to punish a New Jersey mayor who declined to endorse the governor’s re-election.
The two defendants, Bridget Anne Kelly and Bill Baroni, were each charged with seven counts of conspiracy and wire fraud, including misusing the resources of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates the bridge, and violating the rights of the citizens of Fort Lee, N.J., to travel without government restriction when the closings gridlocked their town over five days in September 2013. Though only the two defendants, Bridget Anne Kelly and Bill Baroni, were tried in the so-called Bridgegate case, the scandal surrounding the lane closings in September 2013 left Mr. Christie deeply wounded. It not only helped cripple his presidential candidacy this year, it also tarnished his reputation as a key surrogate in Donald J. Trump’s Republican presidential campaign.
Though Ms. Kelly and Mr. Baroni were the only ones to be tried as a result of the scandal, the trial suggested that Mr. Christie, who has maintained that he knew nothing about the scheme until after it had ended, was deeply involved. A top ally and key prosecution witness testified that Mr. Christie, a Republican, was told of the lane closings as they were occurring, and Ms. Kelly said she discussed the shutdown with the governor before it happened. With the trial unfolding in the weeks before Election Day, aides to Mr. Trump’s persuaded him not to pick Mr. Christie as his vice-presidential nominee. Mr. Christie now leads Mr. Trump’s transition team, but the Trump campaign said after the verdict on Friday that Mr. Christie had “changed his schedule” and would not make appearances in New Hampshire on Saturday.
The scandal not only crippled Mr. Christie’s presidential candidacy this year, but also tarnished his reputation at a time when he has been a key player in Donald J. Trump’s presidential campaign, named to lead his White House transition team and serving as a political surrogate. Mr. Christie is scheduled to campaign for Mr. Trump this weekend in New Hampshire and Pennsylvania, two key battleground states, ahead of the election on Tuesday. Testimony at the trial indicated that Mr. Christie knew about the lane closings as they were causing five days of major traffic jams in Fort Lee, N.J., and that he was deeply involved in covering up the plot even as he continued to insist — as he did again after the verdict was announced — that he knew nothing about it until months after it was over.
On Friday, Mr. Christie again denied any role in the scandal. “Let me be clear once again,” he said in a statement shortly after the verdicts were delivered. “I had no knowledge prior to or during these lane realignments, and had no role in authorizing them. No believable evidence was presented to contradict that fact.” Throughout the seven-week trial, it often seemed as if both the government and the defense were prosecuting Mr. Christie in absentia. Witnesses laid bare a relentlessly political operation in the governor’s office, and portrayed him as a fiery-tempered leader who gave orders to freeze out enemies and once threw a water bottle at Ms. Kelly during a meeting.
The crimes Ms. Kelly and Mr. Baroni were convicted of carry a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, but the United States attorney for New Jersey, Paul J. Fishman, said before the trial that there was “no way” his office would recommend that Ms. Kelly and Mr. Baroni serve terms that long. Federal sentencing guidelines suggest a sentence of one to three years. Sentencing was scheduled for Feb. 21. Mr. Christie’s aides began to use government resources to secure political endorsements the year he entered office, with an eye toward winning not just a broad re-election victory, but also a presidential race six years away. The governor’s loyalists preyed on grief over the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and misused hundreds of millions in taxpayer dollars from what they called “a goody bag” to get support from Democrats as Mr. Christie, a Republican, tried to build a case that he had the wide appeal needed to win the White House.
Mr. Baroni was stoic as the verdict was read, then turned and hugged his father and stepmother, who had sat through every day of the trial. Ms. Kelly began to quiver and cry as the jury foreman went through the counts and answered “guilty” on each one. The federal investigation into the lane closings in has led to guilty pleas by two other confidantes of Mr. Christie: David Wildstein, who was installed as the governor’s enforcer at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates the bridge, pleaded guilty to orchestrating the lane closings and became the prosecution’s chief witness. David Samson, a former New Jersey attorney general whom Mr. Christie appointed as chairman of the agency, pleaded guilty to using his power to get United Airlines to create a special flight to an airport near a home he in South Carolina.
It appeared that it had been an emotional deliberation. As the foreman read the verdict, a juror in front of him covered her eyes with her hand. The repeated mention of Mr. Christie’s name in the courtroom raised questions about why he was not charged. Mr. Wildstein testified that he had told the governor about the scheme at a Sept. 11 memorial service, as the lane closings were taking place.
Afterward, the jurors remained silent and solemn as a team of court marshals escorted them to their cars. One juror, bleary-eyed and tearful, declined to give her name or discuss the case. “No comment, no comment, no comment,” she said, waving off reporters. Ms. Kelly testified that she discussed the shutdown with the governor before and while it was happening. And the governor’s chief political strategist acknowledged on the stand that Mr. Christie had lied at a December 2013 news conference when he said that senior members of his staff and his campaign chief had assured him they were not involved.
Facing a bank of reporters outside the courthouse, Ms. Kelly’s lawyer, Michael Critchley, put his arm around Ms. Kelly and said he would “absolutely” appeal. Facing about 50 reporters and television cameras outside the federal courthouse here on Friday, the United States attorney for New Jersey, Paul J. Fishman, said his office brought charges against only the people it believed a jury would find guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. There was far more documentary evidence to convict Ms. Kelly, Mr. Baroni and Mr. Wildstein.
“I told Bridget this is the first step in the process,” Mr. Critchley said. “I assure you, we will have another news conference. It may take a year or two, but it will be a very different news conference.” “We don’t say we have sort of enough, let’s throw it against the wall and see what the jury does,” Mr. Fishman said. “That’s not our job.”
The jury had asked during deliberations whether a guilty verdict required them to find that the two defendants had intended to punish Fort Lee’s mayor, Mark J. Sokolich, a Democrat; Judge Susan D. Wigenton said no, raising howls of protest from defense lawyers, who argued that intent to punish had been included in the indictment and should be required for a guilty verdict. Mr. Christie issued a statement shortly after the verdicts were delivered, again denying any role in the scandal. “Let me be clear once again,” he said. “I had no knowledge prior to or during these lane realignments, and had no role in authorizing them. No believable evidence was presented to contradict that fact.”
That issue will most likely form the heart of their appeal. Mr. Fishman, who succeeded Mr. Christie as the United States attorney for New Jersey, declined to specifically address the governor’s comments, but pointedly expressed confidence in Mr. Wildstein’s testimony that Mr. Christie was told about the plot.
“The United States attorney’s office should be ashamed of this,” said Michael Baldassare, the lead lawyer for Mr. Baroni. “They said my client pursued a punitive objective against Mayor Sokolich. When it came time to put up at trial, they shut up. They said punishment doesn’t matter.” “When we put witnesses on the stand, we put witnesses on the stand who are corroborated by other evidence,” he said. “And we don’t ask people to testify about things when we think they might not be true.”
Mr. Fishman, the United States attorney for New Jersey, who succeeded Mr. Christie in the position, told reporters outside the courthouse that he took “no pleasure” in the verdict, and found it “sad, honestly” to see people in government use their power for personal or political gain. The jury deliberated for three and a half days before delivering a note shortly before 11 a.m. on Friday indicating it had reached its decision.
“It lends credence to the cynical notion that people have that people in government can’t and shouldn’t be trusted,” he said. The deliberations appeared to have been emotional. As the jury foreman read the verdict, one juror in front of him covered her eyes with her hand. The jurors remained silent and solemn as a team of court officers escorted them to their cars.
“There will be corruption because human nature is what human nature is,” he added. “I do believe that verdicts like this, prosecutions like this, investigations like this, send a message to people that we don’t tolerate it, that it’s not right, and that if you do it and we find out about it we will go after you as hard as we can.” “It wasn’t an easy task,” one juror, Virginia Huffman, said later by telephone. “It’s never easy to find anyone guilty of something. You’re making decisions that have a huge impact on people’s lives.”
The scandal has been the biggest political corruption case in New Jersey in years, riveting a state that has a long history of official malfeasance and leaving Mr. Christie deeply unpopular among his constituents. Mr. Baroni, a former state senator, was stoic as the verdict was delivered, then turned and hugged his father and stepmother, who had attended each day of the trial. Outside the courthouse, Mr. Baroni gave a brief statement, beginning, “I am innocent of these charges,” and vowing to appeal.
During the six-week trial here in federal court, the prosecution and the defense both portrayed the Christie administration as a relentlessly political operation in the service of a fiery-tempered and ambitious governor. Ms. Kelly quivered and then began to cry as the jury foreman repeated “guilty” 14 times. Mr. Baroni’s lawyer, Michael Baldassare, hugged her parents and her aunt in the front row and said, “It’s not over.” About a dozen of Ms. Kelly’s friends had sat through the trial faithfully; outside the courtroom, some of them, too, cried.
Aides began using government resources to seek political endorsements in 2010, the year Mr. Christie entered office, with an eye to winning not just a broad re-election victory in 2013, but also to the 2016 presidential race. Ms. Kelly’s lawyer, Michael Critchley, repeatedly portrayed his client as a single mother of four, and as he left the courtroom, he said that her “first concern is the effect it’s going to have on her children.”
Ms. Kelly, who was deputy chief of staff to Mr. Christie, sent the blunt email that prosecutors said set off the scheme and, when it was made public by a legislative subpoena in 2014, the scandal: “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee.” Outside the courthouse, Mr. Critchley put his arm around Ms. Kelly and said he would “absolutely” appeal.
Mr. Baroni, once Mr. Christie’s top staff appointee at the Port Authority, had ignored increasingly agitated phone, text and email messages from the mayor of Fort Lee about “an urgent matter of public safety” there, with emergency vehicles, school buses and commuters stuck in catastrophic traffic jams. Mr. Christie had avidly but unsuccessfully sought endorsement for re-election from Mr. Sokolich. “I told Bridget this is the first step in the process,” he said, as she stood by quietly. “I assure you, we will have another news conference. It may take a year or two but it will be a very different news conference.”
On the stand, both defendants said they had been duped by another Christie associate, David Wildstein, into believing that the lane closings were a legitimate traffic study. Mr. Wildstein, a secretive former political blogger, had been appointed as an enforcer for Mr. Christie at the Port Authority. Mr. Wildstein pleaded guilty to orchestrating the scheme and became the star witness for the government. The convictions carry a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, but under federal guidelines, Ms. Kelly and Mr. Baroni are likely to be sentenced to far less time.
Mr. Wildstein testified that he had told Mr. Christie about the scheme at a Sept. 11 memorial service, in the middle of the lane closings. And Ms. Kelly testified that she had received the governor’s approval before sending the email triggering what she thought was the traffic study. Mr. Fishman said on Friday he expected his office to recommend that Wildstein be sentenced to 20 to 27 months in prison, and slightly more for Mr. Baroni and Ms. Kelly, because they did not accept responsibility for their crimes, and because prosecutors believe that they did not testify truthfully. Judge Susan D. Wigenton set sentencing for Feb. 21.
But prosecutors had drawn the charges tightly around the specific crime of closing the lanes and then covering up the scheme. At their urging, the judge had explicitly instructed the jury not to consider why other potential co-conspirators were not on trial. The controversy over the lane closings is the biggest political corruption case in New Jersey in years, riveting a state with a long history of official malfeasance.
Ms. Kelly, who was a deputy chief of staff to Mr. Christie, sent the blunt email that prosecutors said had set off the scheme and, when it was made public by a legislative subpoena in 2014, the ensuing scandal: “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee.”
For his part, Mr. Baroni, once Mr. Christie’s top staff appointee at the Port Authority, ignored increasingly agitated phone, text and email messages from Mayor Mark J. Sokolich of Fort Lee about “an urgent matter of public safety,” with emergency vehicles, school buses and commuters stuck in traffic.
On the witness stand, both defendants said they had been duped by Mr. Wildstein, a self-confessed liar and political trickster, into believing that the closings were part of legitimate traffic study.
Both Ms. Kelly and Mr. Baroni were charged with seven counts of conspiracy and wire fraud, including misusing Port Authority resources and violating the rights of Fort Lee citizens to travel without government restriction.
The jury had asked during deliberations whether a guilty verdict required a finding that the two defendants had intended to punish Mr. Sokolich. Judge Wigenton said no, raising sharp protests from defense lawyers who argued that the issue of punishment had been included in the indictment and should be required for a guilty verdict.
That issue is likely to form the heart of any appeal.
“The United States attorney’s office should be ashamed of this,” said Mr. Baldassare, Mr. Baroni’s lawyer. “They said my client pursued a punitive objective against Mayor Sokolich. When it came time to put up at trial, they shut up. They said punishment doesn’t matter.”
Mr. Fishman said the issue had been litigated at least four times before the judge, and that he had confidence the verdict would stand on appeal.
He called the case “sad, honestly.”
“It lends credence to the cynical notion that people have that people in government can’t and shouldn’t be trusted,” Mr. Fishman said.
“There will be corruption because human nature is what human nature is,” he added. “I do believe that verdicts like this, prosecutions like this, investigations like this send a message to people that we don’t tolerate it, that it’s not right, and that if you do it and we find out about it, we will go after you as hard as we can.”