This Week in BINGO: Somebody’s at the door

This week’s wrap-up is brought to you by the Letter ‘B.’

With the 2010 Alabama legislative session at an end, and state legislators forced again to pay for their own drinks, the Department of Justice has invited lawmakers to return to Montgomery — this time to tell what they know under oath.

As many as 50 Alabama lawmakers have been subpoenaed, including House Speaker Seth Hammett. This comes as Hammett was supposed to be done with Montgomery politics. The Democrat from Andalusia was set to retire when the session ended, but federal investigators won’t let him go so fast.

Hammett said this week that he has no knowledge of illegal activity regarding legislation to legalize electronic bingo. Those bills passed through the Alabama Senate but died in the state House when the session closed.

Hammett told The Huntsville Times that investigators have indicated he is not a target of the bingo probe.

Several other lawmakers confirmed they have received subpoenas.

State Senator Steve French (R-Mountain Brook) told The Birmingham News that he began cooperating with investigators after the now-infamous April Fools Day meeting with federal authorities. In that meeting with legislators, federal officials said this investigation was more than a “fishing expedition” and that legislators had this opportunity to come forward and cooperate.

French told the News that he had received offers from pro-bingo lobbyists that he thought were inappropriate.

Others who have been subpoenaed include:

• Rep. Mac Gipson (R-Prattville);
• Sen. Paul Sanford (R-Hunstville);
• Sen. Phil Poole, (D-Tuscaloosa);
• Rep. Craig Ford (D-Gadsden);
• Sen. Tom Butler (D-Madison);
• Sen. Hinton Mitchem (D-Union Grove);
• Sen. Scott Beason (R-Gardendale);
• Sen. Charles Bishop (R-Arley).

Poole told The Tuscaloosa News that he’s only heard rumors about bingo corruption and doesn’t know anything specific to tell the grad jury. However, he said he knew of other corrupt activities in Montgomery which he intended to share with investigators.

It is as yet unclear which lawmakers might have been cooperating earlier than April 1, but at least two are said to have been wearing listening devices during the session.

Sanford, a freshman senator, has said that pro-bingo lobbyist Jarrod Massey offered him two campaign donations of $125,000, but Sanford qualified his statement, saying that there was no quid-pro-quo offered to him.

Massey has denied that he made any such offer. A network of PACs operated by Massey made significant campaign contributions to key legislators who later provided swing votes for bingo bills, but none of those contributions were of the magnitude Sanford described.

Meanwhile, local jurisdictions are still holding out hope for bingo dollars. Florala Mayor Robert Williamson told the Andalusia Star-News that all his city needs to open a bingo facility is a favorable opinion from Alabama Attorney General Troy King.

“We’ve been called the bingo turtle,” Williamson told the Star-News. “We’re slow in process, but we’re committed.”

In Jefferson County tempers flared at a town hall meeting when Bessmer Mayor Ed May and Council President Earl Cochran attempted to talk over each other, with Cochran even pulling the microphone from May’s hands. Police had to step between the men, the Birmingham News reported.

May told the News that his opposition from the council was over his opposition to a city bingo ordinance.