When Lawyers Practice Politics--- People Get Hurt

A Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article by Patrick Marley raises more questions about potential corruption at the top of Jim Doyle’s Administration.

According to Marc Marotta’s official calendar for April 6, 2005, he attended a meeting in his Department of Administration office with Doyle’s campaign fundraiser, Katie Boyce and three Philadelphia attorneys with the law firm of Schiffren & Barroway. Governor Doyle’s campaign deposited a check from one of those attorneys for $10,000 on the same day. The attorney who wrote a check for the maximum amount allowed by state law had never contributed to a Wisconsin candidate before.

Spokespeople for the Department of Administration and the Doyle campaign deny that Boyce attended the meeting and say that there was no connection between the meeting at DOA and the $10,000 contribution.

Here’s what they told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

Katie Boyce, Doyle's fund- raiser, helped arrange the meeting, said Anson Kaye, a spokesman for Doyle's campaign. Marotta's calendar lists Boyce as an attendee to the meeting, but Kaye said she was included on the calendar in error.

The meeting "was completely about what business they could offer to the state, and he referred them swiftly to SWIB," Dilweg said.

OK. Let’s give Kaye and Dilweg the benefit of the doubt and say that Katie Boyce did not attend the meeting and only helped arrange it. Why would the Governor’s campaign fundraiser be talking to litigators from Philadelphia about potential business with the State Investment Board?

Dilweg claims that Marotta “swiftly” referred the attorneys to the State Investment Board. Again, giving Dilweg the benefit of the doubt, if it was perfectly appropriate for Marotta to meet with firms wishing to do business with the State Investment Board, why did he refer them away so “swiftly”, and if the attorneys met with Investment Board staff the day before, who arranged that meeting?

On the other hand, if Marotta was not the appropriate point of contact for the three attorneys, why did they end up on his calendar in the first place, and did any other state officials attend that meeting, say perhaps Marotta’s Executive Assistant, Sean Dilweg?

The claim that there was no connection between the meeting in Marotta’s state office on April 6, 2005 and the $10,000 check to the Doyle campaign on the same day is absurd given that the meeting was arranged, and perhaps attended by the Governor’s campaign fundraiser Katie Boyce.

Since the law firm of Schiffren and Barroway didn’t end up doing business with the State Investment Board, could there have been another reason for the meeting with Marotta?