Democrat McDermott Pays Price for His Sleaze
Another friendly reminder to the world that DEMOCRAT is the party of ILLEGAL WIRETAPS!
A federal judge in Washington has ordered Democratic Rep. Jim McDermott to pay more than $1 million in attorney’s fees awarded to Minority Leader John A. Boehner as part of a protracted lawsuit involving an illegally taped cell phone call.
U.S. District Judge Thomas P. Hogan ruled that McDermott, D-Wash., must pay $1,053,181, plus $520,761 in interest to Boehner, R-Ohio.
The payment order, issued Monday, stems from an unusual member-vs.-member case that Boehner filed long before he became the House Republican leader.
Boehner sued McDermott in 1998, accusing him of leaking the contents of a conference call that a Florida couple had illegally taped from Boehner’s cell phone in 1996.
In the call, Republican leaders, including then-Speaker Newt Gingrich of Georgia (1979-99), discussed responding to ethics allegations against Gingrich, who served as Speaker from 1995 to 1999.
McDermott at the time was the ranking Democrat on the House ethics panel.
The attorney’s fee payment comes on top of $60,000 in damages that McDermott already has paid Boehner out of his legal expense fund.
In December, McDermott paid Boehner $50,000 in court-ordered punitive damages, $10,000 in statutory damages and another $4,169 in interest, according to public disclosure filings. The payment was made shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court refused to review a federal appeals court ruling in Boehner’s favor.
