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DEL.ICIO.USWitness: Contractor paid for gambling trips
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Former city official Michael Sullivan testified today that a city contractor who was a friend of former Atlanta Mayor Bill Campbell’s used to give cash to Campbell on gambling trips.
Sullivan, who was the city contracts compliance director, said that contractor Ricky Rowe told him he would “take care of the mayorâ€? while on gambling trips.
Federal prosecutor Russell Vineyard asked the witness to explain.
“He [Rowe] told me he would give the mayor cash to gamble with on those trips,” Sullivan testified. Rowe died in April 2004.
Vineyard asked Sullivan how Rowe described his relationship with the mayor.
“[Rowe] used the term when he referred to the mayor as ‘That’s my ho,’ Sullivan said. Vineyard asked what Sullivan he thought Rowe meant by the reference.
“I took it that he meant he had bought the mayor, he owned the mayor,” said Sullivan, who is on the stand for the second day.
The prosecution is using Sullivan’s testimony to show a pattern of behavior by Campbell to become involved in the awarding of contracts to people in exchange for favors.
Sullivan was fired by Campbell in 1996 after the contract compliance director had received several sexual harassment complaints. By 1998, Sullivan had joined a company called United Water, which was trying to get a contract to take over management of the city’s water system. Sullivan’s job was to come up with an affirmative action plan for the company. United Water won the $21 million annual contract.
Sullivan testified Thursday that he met with Campbell at a United Negro College fund Ball in December 1998.
“He told me that he had always said he will take care of me,” said Sullivan, who said the mayor was referring to United Water getting the contract.
After an objection by the defense, Vineyard asked Sullivan what Campbell said to him about United Water.
“That (Campbell) had selected United Water because he was looking out for me,” Sullivan repeated.
Sullivan also testified about United Water’s involvement in arranging a trip to Paris in the summer of 1999 for Campbell and the former mayor’s friend and chief operating officer, Larry Wallace.
Sullivan testified that Wallace asked him if he could “arrange for he [Wallace] and Mr. Campbell to be taken care of in Paris?” Sullivan said Wallace wanted United Water to pay the expenses of the trip.
In its opening statement earlier this week, the defense said the Paris trip was for business and that the prosecution could offer no proof that it was otherwise.
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