Government rests case against commissioner; O’Donnell to take witness stand Thursday
The federal government rested its case Wednesday against Sedgwick County Commissioner Michael O’Donnell — but not before putting on three more of his friends who talked about payments they’d receive out of O’Donnell’s campaign accounts.
O’Donnell is charged with 23 counts of wire fraud and three counts of money laundering alleging he misspent donations members of the public made to his 2012 campaign for state senator and his 2016 campaign for Sedgwick County commissioner. At the heart of the government’s case is their theory that he used campaign funds to buy and maintain friendships with a group of young men — which benefited him personally.
O’Donnell’s defense attorneys are arguing he did nothing illegal and had the discretion to spend campaign dollars as he saw fit on anything campaign-related — including paying friends to be stand-by workers.
The case is expected to be in jurors’ hands for deliberations no later than Friday morning.
Among friends of O’Donnell’s called to testify Wednesday was Jack Masterson, who told jurors that he didn’t recall doing any campaign-related work to earn six checks he received from one of O’Donnell’s campaign accounts.
He got checks — $300 to $550 each — monthly from December 2015 until May 2016, while he was a Wichita State student. Masterson described O’Donnell as “a very generous and supportive friend” who understood that he needed to focus on school.
“I thought Michael was giving me money to get by until I got a job,” Masterson testified, adding: “My dad had passed (away) and he offered to give me some money in exchange for working on his campaign.”
But, he said, ultimately he did no work.
Defense attorneys in response told jurors that Masterson fetched breakfast for an event, went to a Garth Brooks concert with O’Donnell as a staffer and had attended a rally for then-candidate Donald Trump in downtown Wichita with O’Donnell’s campaign. They’ve attributed any lapse in memory Masterson has about his role with the campaign to his “being in a fog” following his father’s death.
But Masterson testified that he didn’t recall the breakfast and had gone to the Trump rally to volunteer for the Kansas GOP. He said he only recalls one discussion with O’Donnell about performing work — delivering a gift basket, which he said he didn’t end up doing. He went to the concert on O’Donnell’s invitation to “watch Garth Brooks and drink beer,” he said.
He denies ever being in a fog, saying that actually his school grade point average increased after his dad’s death. Mentally, “I was there,” he told jurors.
A second friend called to the witnes stand, David Jorgensen, told jurors that he did do some work for O’Donnell’s campaigns for senate and county commission, including creating donor spreadsheets, walking in a parade and making signs. But O’Donnell, he said, continued to send him checks drawn on campaign accounts in months when he was living and studying in northeast Kansas and did nothing campaign-related.
The total amount he was paid over two years was $9,450.
Asked why he thought O’Donnell was sending him monthly checks, Jorgensen said: “He wanted to pay me. I asked for work to do. Sometimes I did work. Sometimes I didn’t. He paid me every month. I needed the money especially when I was an undergrad at Wichita State.” He’s a medical school student now.
Defense attorney Mark Schoenhofer on cross-examination suggested O’Donnell paid Jorgensen because he considered him an asset to the campaigns and because he was ready to assist in campaign-related matters “at the drop of a hat.”
Schoenhofer also suggested Jorgensen just didn’t remember all of the work he’d done because Jorgensen kept no records of his work.
A third friend, Johnathan Dennill, testified to being confused about why O’Donnell gave him a $1,000 check drawn on his “Michael for Kansas” account and asked Dennill to give him a personal check for the same amount in return. He said he thought the checks were being swapped because he needed to pay for his part of a group ski trip to Aspen in 2015.
On O’Donnell’s campaign finance report, the check was listed as a payment for photography services. The defense contends the payment was a bonus for unpaid campaign work.
Asked by prosecutors whether Dennill thought he got the $1,000 check for photography services, he said: “No, I don’t think so.”
Under defense questioning, Dennill said he later thought the payment was likely a bonus. But he said there was never any actual discussion about that with O’Donnell.
The defense on Wednesday also put on its first witnesses of the case. Among those jurors heard from was Carol Williams, former head of the Kansas Governmental Ethics Commission, which is responsible for enforcing the state’s campaign finance law. During the 40 years she worked for the commission, she handled 20 election cycles and worked with “thousands and thousands” of candidates and their campaigns, she told jurors.
Although the law prohibits using donor dollars to pay for personal expenses, Williams said candidates have a lot of discretion to decide how to spend it in connection with their campaigns. That includes how, when and in what amount to pay staffers and what sort of fundraisers to hold.
She testified that there’s nothing in law that prohibits a candidate from using campaign funds to pay a person to be on stand-by for a campaign, that campaigns often recruit family and friends as workers and that bonuses can be paid.
She also said she doesn’t recall a single instance where federal authorities questioned a state or local candidates’ use of campaign funds.
The defense plans to present the bulk of its case Thursday. O’Donnell will take the witness stand.
