Former state Rep. Tyrone Brooks said he will now devote his life to helping find members of a lynch mob who murdered two black couples at Moore’s Ford bridge in Walton County.
If any of the miscreants from that 1946 crime are still alive, they’d be 90 or older. But the hunt must continue, he said. It’s like ferreting out surviving Nazi war criminals.
But in Georgia, there are hundreds of people who never learned to read and are still very much alive. Many of them are black, most are poor and likely still illiterate. Tyrone Brooks raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to help these and others who exist on the margins of society, the people he always fought for. But then, according to the feds, he spent the money on himself and family members.
Last Wednesday, Brooks wrote a letter to Gov. Nathan Deal saying he was resigning to find justice for those who were lynched, citing the passing of time, witnesses and suspects. The effort would become “my # 1 priority,” he wrote.
A day later, he pleaded guilty in federal court to a count of falsifying his income taxes and nolo contendere to five counts of fraud. He never mentioned his legal troubles in his letter, nor would he talk much about them out near Moore’s Ford where he held a press conference Friday, the day after he threw himself on the mercy of a judge.
On Friday, he did not sound like a chastened man. The 30-count fraud and tax evasion indictment, he says, was an act of revenge by a federal government angered by him continually digging at the ugly sore that is the Moore's Ford Lynching. Through recent years, and at Brooks' urging, the FBI and GBI have reinvestigated the killings without success.
Brooks said he wants to raise money for a museum to teach new generations about not-that-long-ago horrors. That his money-raising ability is also history seems lost on him.
‘People understand what’s going on’
He likened his prosecution to the persecution of Martin Luther King Jr. orchestrated by FBI director J. Edgar Hoover.
“When they can’t stop him, they’re going to smear him,” he said. “This is a continuation of destroying Martin Luther King’s movement. People understand what’s going on.”
I’m sure they do. He got caught and is spinning a whopper just a day after humbling himself before a judge. He’s a proud man who has built a considerable legacy and much of it is now in ruins. It’s natural to not accept that.
State Rep. Tyrone Brooks, who spent 35 years in the Georgia House alternating as a social conscience and racial scold, a man who marched with King and who fought the good fight for decades, was caught ripping off those who have (fat cat companies like Coca-Cola and Georgia Power) as well as those who have not (illiterate citizens and young people without hope living in violent neighborhoods.)
The indictment said Brooks collected more than $800,000 in donations for Universal Humanities, a charity he founded in 1990 with no functioning board of directors, and then funneled much of it to a second account where he spent it like it was his own.
In a release from Acting U.S. Attorney John Horn, Brooks spent the money on “home repairs, furniture, lawn service, life insurance, entertainment, personal credit card expenses, utility bills, food and clothing, drying cleaning, electronic equipment, jewelry and payments on personal loans.”
‘Who are you going to believe?’
The feds allege he acted similarly as president of GABEO, the Georgia Association of Black Elected Officials, depositing $300,000 in donations from 2002 to 2012 and siphoning them to a second account.
The companies and organizations that gave money to his charity or to GABEO did so because of Brooks' reputation as a man out there working for the little guy. Coca-Cola gets more than 1,500 charity requests each year, the indictment states. Brooks' legislative seat helped his requests stand out among those hundreds of others. And the premise that he was working for minorities made it sound even better for those making donations.
When challenged by a reporter on his conspiracy theory, he shot back, “Who are you going to believe, Roy Barnes or the government?”
Barnes, the former governor and friend from decades ago when the two served in the Legislature, calls himself “an old country lawyer” and says Brooks admits to making a false statement in his taxes but “has always contended there was no intent to deceive” in ripping off donors to his charity or GABEO.
Barnes disputes that more than $1 million was misappropriated.
“There’s no question this fellow has given his life to the betterment of fellow human beings,” Barnes said outside the courthouse. “It’s not like he had another job other than the General Assembly.”
“He has gotten used to eating and using an auto to drive all over the state,” said Barnes.
‘It’s a sad day’
Being a legislator pays a bit more than $17,000 a year plus per diem. One might suppose Brooks reasoned he was owed a few dollars here and there because of all the hard work he did.
But the Old Country Lawyer must have convinced his client that going to trial against the U.S. government would be disastrous. For a month, the media would carry stories of schemes and under-handed dealing and even stories of Brooks’ family members getting money. They might even be called to testify.
That Brooks is not exactly ‘fessing up on the fraud charges is not lost on prosecutors, who refer to his “nolo” pleas as “guilty” pleas. (“Nolo contendere,” as anyone who’s been to traffic court knows, is Latin for “Ya got me and I ain’t gonna fight it.”) Prosecutors will likely also bring up many of the other charges in arguments during sentencing to show a method of operation. Prison time is certainly a consideration for the 69-year-old.
Even Judge Amy Totenberg, a Democratic appointee, said a nolo plea can be considered as bad as if he went to trial and lost. Worse, she said, it might be viewed as not accepting responsibility. That is something all judges like to see. “Your sentence can be worse than if you accepted a guilty plea,” she told him.
And that was said before he stood before cameras and called out the government. Again.
“It’s a sad day,” the judge noted with seemingly genuine sincerity. “You have played a very active role in improving justice in this state.”
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