By Joe Anuta
Lawyers defending a pair of former campaign aides to city Comptroller John Liu contended in closing arguments Wednesday the two were accused of corruption and wire fraud only because the government could not get to the mayoral candidate himself.
Jia “Jenny” Hou and Xing Wu “Oliver” Pan were charged in Manhattan federal court with conspiring to use a scheme involving straw donors — campaign contributors designed to conceal the true source of donations — in order to gain matching funds provided by the city Campaign Finance Board. Hou was also charged with obstructing justice and lying to federal agents.
“Mr. Pan is collateral damage of the government’s obsessive pursuit of making a case against John Liu,” Irwin Rochman, Pan’s lawyer, said during his summations Wednesday. “I don’t represent John Liu. I don’t give a damn about John Liu, but that’s how we got here … This case does not belong in this courtroom.”
Liu has not been charged with any crime, although the government probed his campaign for years and his name and image appeared numerous times throughout the two-week trial. He has adamantly maintained his innocence as he continues his run for Gracie Mansion.
Rochman was one of three lawyers who spoke in the final days of the trial Tuesday and Wednesday. Hou’s defense attorney Gerald Lefcourt and assistant U.S. attorneys Brian Jacobs and Justin Anderson also attempted to sway the jury before the group was sent to decide the former aides’ fates Wednesday afternoon.
Anderson argued the actions of Pan and Hou represented a larger effort by Liu’s mayoral campaign team to fraudulently obtain matching funds from the finance board. The board matches all donations — $6-to-$1 — for any contribution up to $175 given by New York City residents. Emails show Hou also offered to reimburse an ex-boyfriend for donations before a July filing with the finance board.
Using straw donors violates state law, but it is not specifically what Hou and Pan had been charged with. Money for the city’s matching funds program is transferred via interstate wire, making the abuse of the system a federal crime. Prosecutors had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt Pan and Hou were specifically motivated by obtaining matching funds for the Liu campaign, according to the defense.
Rochman contended Pan may have violated state law, but was not motivated by the desire to obtain matching funds. Hou was unaware of the use of straw donors, Lefcourt argued, though she offered to reimburse an ex-boyfriend in an incident unrelated to matching funds.
Much of the testimony revolved around two fund-raising events involving straw donors that occurred in 2011 — one sponsored by a prominent businessman in the Chinese community and another put together by Pan.
Several men from the business community testified they reimbursed straw donors who gave to Liu’s mayoral campaign at one of these events. The prosecution contends Hou played an integral role in both collecting the money she knew came from the straw donors and then concealing the evidence from the finance board and later the FBI.
Pan, on the other hand, admitted in court to reimbursing a group of straw donors for the other event using money provided by a Texas businessman named Richard Kong — actually an undercover FBI agent named John Chiue — who wanted to curry favor with a New York City official in City Hall.
Rochman argued Pan carried out the straw donor scheme as a personal favor to Chiue, who Pan believed was a close friend, and not to defraud New York City taxpayers of election matching funds, as he was charged with.
“This case is not about whether Mr. Pan created straw donor contributions,” Rochman said. “It is about why.”
Pan’s straw donations were contingent on Chiue getting his desired face-to-face meeting with Liu, Rochman contends.
He further argued that Pan was entrapped by Chiue, meaning that he would not have orchestrated the donations otherwise.
Lefcourt argued that Hou was simply doing her job, knew nothing of the straw donations at either of the 2011 meetings and had nothing to conceal.
The businessmen who allegedly reimbursed donors at one fund-raiser also testified they acted on their own and lied to Hou about the source of the donations. She could not have known that the donations were fraudulent, Lefcourt said, especially regarding mismatched handwriting.
“A big issue in this case is about Chinese language,” he said, indicating that the forms had to be filled out in English even though a portion of Liu’s base comes from Asian immigrants who in many cases can only write in their native tongue. It is not necessarily illegal for a campaign aide to fill out a contribution for someone else, but often draws the eye of finance board auditors.
Hou was not supposed to be present at the second event put together by Pan, Lefcourt argued, where she was recorded by the FBI going through donation forms.
Reach reporter Joe Anuta by e-mail at januta@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4566.
