Most people picture prosecutorial misconduct as one rogue lawyer hiding one document. Professor Bennett Gershman, a former New York prosecutor and author of the treatise Prosecutorial Misconduct, says that when it’s deliberate and coordinated, it looks like what happened to Governor Don Siegelman. In 2014 he called it “one of the most egregiously bad faith prosecutions by the Justice Department ever.”

In this episode, Professor Gershman, Governor Siegelman, and host Nick Collado go through how a case like this comes together: the key witness, the conflicts of interest, the judge, and the jury.

Gershman says he has never seen a witness handled the way Nick Bailey was, citing 71 interviews with prosecutors. He also says he learned during his research that prosecutors asked for a life sentence over a campaign contribution to a ballot initiative. The Governor adds his account of the jury’s questions, the judge’s instructions, and the jurors’ messages during deliberations. He also covers Judge Mark Fuller’s history, the 911 call, and the federal judiciary’s findings before Fuller resigned.

Then they take on the bigger question: why prosecutors are almost never held accountable. Gershman explains absolute immunity, why prosecutors are rarely prosecuted or disciplined, and why he separates deliberate misconduct from honest mistakes. He still sees signs of change: federal judges who say they no longer trust prosecutors, grand juries refusing to indict, and a new prosecutor conduct commission in New York. The Governor describes his request for the records of Bailey’s interviews, and says the Obama and Biden administrations refused to turn them over. Gershman also draws comparisons to prosecutions in the news today.

The episode closes with the Governor thanking Gershman for writing in his defense, including a request that President Obama pardon him.

This is Episode [#] of Me and the Gov, a series of in-depth conversations with former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, hosted by Nick Collado.

🎙️ Subscribe for the full series, available on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.

Governor Jim Doyle on the Woman Who Went to Prison Instead of Him | Me and The Gov Episode 10

In 2006, Georgia Thompson — a career Wisconsin civil servant Governor Jim Doyle had never even met — was convicted and sent to federal prison over a $1 million travel contract. No bribe. No kickback. No money ever changed hands. She served four months before a federal appeals court took the almost unheard-of step of ordering her released the same day, live from the bench, calling the case against her "beyond thin."

In this episode, former Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle joins Governor Don Siegelman and host Nick Collado to walk through what actually happened — including the real courtroom audio from her hearing, and the actual Republican-aligned attack ad that ran statewide against Doyle off her conviction. Doyle reveals that after Thompson was convicted, prosecutors approached her again and offered to keep her out of prison if she'd simply change her sworn testimony. She refused, and went to prison anyway.

The two governors trace the same names through both of their cases — David Margolis, the DOJ official who approved the charging decision against Thompson and was separately deeply involved in Siegelman's own prosecution, and Jack Abramoff, who Siegelman says laundered $20 million in casino money specifically to defeat both of them in the same election cycle.

The episode also plays a clip from former Republican Arizona Attorney General Grant Woods, who says on camera that Siegelman was targeted because Republicans "couldn't beat him fair and square" — and closes with Doyle's own raw reaction, recorded the day Thompson walked free.

This is Episode 10 of Me and the Gov — a series of in-depth conversations with former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, hosted by Nick Collado.

🎙️ Subscribe for the full series, available on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.

#JimDoyle #DonSiegelman #MeAndTheGov #Podcast #GeorgiaThompson #PoliticalCorruption #WisconsinPolitics #KarlRove #DavidMargolis #JackAbramoff #PoliticalScandal #TrueCrime

"I Was Working for the Sith Lords": A Fired U.S. Attorney Tells His Story | Me and The Gov Episode 9

In 2001, David Iglesias was everything the Republican Party said it wanted in a future leader — a Navy JAG officer, an evangelical, a combat veteran, personally sponsored by his own senator. By 2006, he was fired by phone, on a script, the same week as six other U.S. Attorneys across the country.

In this episode, Captain David Iglesias joins Governor Don Siegelman and host Nick Collado to go through his book "In Justice" — including playing his actual 2007 Senate testimony describing the phone call that ended his career: Senator Pete Domenici personally calling him at home, asking if corruption indictments against Democrats would be filed before the election, then hanging up when Iglesias said no. Five weeks later, he was gone.

Iglesias and Siegelman trace the same fingerprints across both of their cases — Karl Rove's own business partner's wife appointed as the prosecutor in Alabama, Rove personally "agitated" over Iglesias in New Mexico, and the revelation that New Jersey's Chris Christie was actually removed from an early firing list right as Iglesias's name was added. They also connect the pattern to a third case in Wisconsin, and to Rove's own history of political dirty tricks going back to Texas.

Governor Siegelman reveals new detail about David Margolis, the DOJ official who cleared the conflict of interest in his prosecution, fired the whistleblower who came forward, and was quoted telling an inspector that if the public knew how Siegelman's case was really handled, it would be a "huge embarrassment" for the Justice Department.

This is Episode 9 of Me and the Gov — a series of in-depth conversations with former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, hosted by Nick Collado.

🎙️ Subscribe for the full series, available on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.

#DonSiegelman #DavidIglesias #KarlRove #MeAndTheGov #Podcast #USAttorneys #PoliticalCorruption #DavidMargolis #AlabamaPolitics #NewMexico #PoliticalScandal #TrueCrime