NEWS

Free for now, Corrine Brown is back in her element

Unrestrained by court order, former congresswoman lashes out at guilty verdict

Nate Monroe
Former U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown is escorted by Bishop Rudolph McKissick Sr. as she leaves the federal courthouse on May 11 after being convicted on 18 of counts of conspiracy, mail and wire fraud and tax crimes. (Bob Self/Florida Times-Union)

No longer under oath or constrained by the rules of criminal court, former U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown has found her voice again.

Brown — convicted May 11 on 18 counts ofconspiracy, mail and wire fraud and tax crimes — was under orders not to make public comments during the trial.

And on the stand, Brown, accustomed to overpowering reporters with long commentaries and non-sequiturs, had to be direct when facing prosecutors. Those dynamics seemed to throw the loose-lipped former congresswoman off balance.

But in a round of interviews last week — amid a long-shot bid for a new trial — Brown was back in her element.

She accused the U.S. Attorney’s Office of engaging in a “straight-out, fake prosecution.” She called the unanimous verdicts from the 12-member jury wrong. She has questioned the wisdom of U.S. District Judge Timothy Corrigan’s decision to remove a juror who said the “Holy Spirit” told him she was innocent of all the charges against her.

Slideshow: Evidence shown in Corrine Brown's fraud trial

Under questioning by Assistant U.S. Attorney A. Tysen Duva during cross-examination, Brown was often at a loss to explain seemingly damning evidence. She didn’t know, for example, why one of her tax filings reported a $12,500 donation to the sham nonprofit One Door for Education — a donation she admitted she never made. She didn’t know why her former accountant testified that Brown herself provided the charitable contribution figures that later turned out to be fake.

She couldn’t explain why her former chief of staff, Ronnie Simmons, was making regular $800 cash deposits into her account, and she didn’t know why years of such cash deposits were never reported as income.

Outside the courthouse, Brown seems to have shed that uncertainty.

“Clearly if they had followed the instructions it would have been not guilty,” she said of the jury’s decision to convict her on fraud during an interview with WJXT TV-4. “I still feel it was a witch hunt, and I stand by that.”

“I am having some real serious concerns about not just the criminal justice system … but even the jury,” she told First Coast News.

Despite the outcome of the trial, some of Brown’s closest supporters still believe in her innocence with religious zeal.

“Congresswoman, we’re giving a sacrifice of praise for you,” said Pastor Rudolph McKissick Jr., pastor at Bethel Baptist Church, where Brown is a member, during an early morning sermon May 14.

“It don’t matter what they say, it don’t matter what they do, it don’t matter what they try to call you … God ain’t through with you yet. There’s a greater beginning on the other side,” he said.

Brown’s attorney, James Smith III, did not return messages from the Times-Union requesting an interview with Brown.

She has repeatedly refused to speak with the newspaper.

Times-Union stories in early 2016 were the first time any connections between Brown and One Door for Education — the sham charity at the center of her fraud trial — were made public and outlined in detail. Before her indictment last year, Brown accused the newspaper of engaging in a witch hunt and said its reporting was “foolishness.” She has also accused the newspaper of racism.

A HISTORY OF CONTROVERSY

The aftermath of her felony convictions is not the first time Brown responded to adversity by questioning the motives of people and groups she sees as enemies.

• In 1998, Brown wanted two St. Petersburg Times reporters arrested after they tried to question her about how her daughter became the owner of a $50,000 luxury car. The newspaper’s reporting raised questions about Brown’s relationship with Foutanga Dit Babani Sissoko, a rich, incarcerated African businessman she tried to have freed. An acquaintance of Sissoko’s later gave Brown’s daughter, Shantrel, the Lexus.

Brown complained to the U.S. Capitol Police the reporters tried to “intimidate” her by holding a tape recorder close to her while blocking her path. Federal prosecutors took no action on Brown’s complaint.

• During a July 2004 debate in Congress, Brown called the 2000 election of President George W. Bush a “coup d’etat” and said Republicans “stole the election.” Her comments were stricken from the Congressional Record and the House voted to rebuke her.

• Brown made a vigorous but unsuccessful legal challenge to the Florida Supreme Court’s decision, finalized last year, redrawing the 5th Congressional District into an east-west configuration running from Jacksonville to Tallahassee. Since 1992, Brown had campaigned in a north-south district that twisted and turned from Jacksonville to Orlando in a salamander-like shape.

She told her constituents the move was motivated by a desire to disenfranchise black voters, despite evidence the district would still favor a black Democratic candidate.

“Bullies have played a dirty trick to force me out of office by re-drawing my Congressional district to cover a largely rural area of north Florida and include 22 prisons, and convicted felons can’t vote,” she wrote on a campaign blog last year.

Although Brown lost re-election in the newly redrawn district, another black candidate, U.S. Rep. Al Lawson, now holds the seat.

• In March 2016, she kicked reporters out of a Tallahassee buffet restaurant after refusing to answer questions about the investigation surrounding One Door.

• A few months later, after her indictment, Brown blasted federal prosecutors and sought to connect her legal troubles with unrelated tragedies in other parts of the country.

“Two black men were needlessly gunned down by police; 5 Dallas police officers were slain by a demented man, and on Friday I had to appear in federal court,” she wrote on her blog.

A NEW TRIAL?

Smith, Brown’s defense lawyer, said after the jury reached its verdict he would seek a new trial. Smith hasn’t said how, but the most obvious route seems to be attacking Corrigan’s decision to remove a juror who said “the Holy Spirit” told him Brown was innocent.

At first glance, it seems Smith might have a chance at getting his new trial, but it’s far from guaranteed, said Colin Miller, an associate dean at the University of South Carolina’s School of Law.

“It’s going to depend very much on the exact facts” of what Corrigan and the juror said before the judge made his decision, said Miller, who has researched and written about challenging jury verdicts.

He said removing the juror would be the right choice if the juror wouldn’t follow his oath to decide the case based on evidence presented in court. But otherwise, he said, Brown would be owed a new trial.

A transcript unsealed this week shows Corrigan tried to hit a careful balance in questioning the juror, who said he was doing what the judge asked of him.

“Do you consider yourself to be following the court’s instructions … free from any influence of religion or political or moral beliefs?” Corrigan asked.

“I’ve been following and listening to what has been presented and making a determination from that,” the juror answered, but later talked about receiving information.

“When you say you received information, from what source?” the judge asked.

“My Father in Heaven,” the juror said.

“… I want you to understand I am not criticizing you or saying you did anything wrong. We’re just trying to figure some things out here,” the judge said later, asking the man what he had told other jurors.

“Did you say the words, ‘A higher being told me that Corrine Brown was not guilty on all charges?’ ”

The juror answered: “No. I said the Holy Spirit told me that.”

Smith objected when the judge later dismissed the juror and replaced him with an alternate. This week, he and Duva, the federal prosecutor, seemed to be positioning themselves for another scuffle over whether attorneys might be allowed to go back and contact at least some of the jurors to ask about things said during jury deliberations, a topic they’re normally prohibited from getting into.

Getting the judge’s permission to question jurors would be “sort of a collateral way to attack the verdict,” Miller said, and might strengthen Smith’s case for a new trial. But there are clear rules against asking those questions, except in very narrow circumstances.

Corrigan turned down an oral request from Smith to contact one juror who had emailed him she could have information useful for an appeal. The judge said he would let Smith ask again in writing, laying out the best argument he could make.