Harvey Whittemore, a powerful real estate tycoon and major player in Nevada politics, has been convicted of making illegal campaign contributions to Senate majority leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., according to the Associated Press.
A jury deliberated for two days before coming back with a guilty decision on three felony counts: excessive campaign contributions, making campaign contributions in someone else's name and causing a false statement to be made to the Federal Election Commission, reports the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
Whittemore is facing up to 15 years in prison as well as hundreds of thousands of dollars of potential fines for illegally giving $150,000 to Reid's reelection campaign in 2007. U.S. District Judge Larry Hicks declared a mistrial on an additional count of lying to the FBI when jurors couldn't come to a consensus.
At his lawyer's office a defiant Whittemore proclaimed his innocence and announced his intention to appeal the ruling.
"I'm confident that we will prevail and then I will say to everybody here...and tell everybody the complete and true story of exactly how this happened, why this happened, who was behind this and how it got started," Whittemore told reporters.
Whittemore's lead attorney, Dominic Gentile, revealed that a plea bargain was offered early in the case but it was turned down, according to the Review-Journal.
"If we had to do it over again, Mr. Whittemore would not plead guilty because he is not guilty," Gentile told reporters.
First Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven Myhre read a statement outside the courthouse on behalf of the prosecution.
"The jury has spoken and it is our hope that its verdict today sends a strong message to the community that violations of campaign finance laws are serious offenses that will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law and that those who violate these laws will be held accountable," Myhre said. "These laws exist to protect the election process from undue influence and to provide transparency to the voting public."
Harry Reid was unaware that there were any problems with donations that were given to him during the election, according to the Associated Press.
"I received $25 million. He raised $150,000," Reid said about Whittemore while talking to the Las Vegas Sun. "I had money coming in from other places."
