Dana Siegelman to Attempt to Speak to POTUS Saturday at 50th Observation of Bloody Sunday

SELMA, Ala. - March 6, 2015 - PRLog -- Newly discovered evidence at the Dept. of Justice supports her father’s claim of a politically motivated prosecution but has not been turned over to his lawyers. Dana Siegelman will be present for President Obama's speech today in Selma observing the 50^th commemoration of Bloody Sunday. She hopes to gain the President's ear.

The new evidence found by the Project For Government Oversight seems to have been hidden by the Department of Justice. It is exculpatory and should have been turned over to her father’s lawyers. Don Siegelman was Alabama's last Democratic Governor in more than twenty-five years.

According to a December 2014 report by Project On Government Oversight, (POGO) an unnamed federal prosecutor emailed Rob Riley in December 2002. Rob was the son of then Governor-elect Bob Riley, who had defeated Governor Siegelman in November. Despite damaging rumors of investigation by the US Attorney’s office, Siegelman seemed to have been re-elected until an Election Night “glitch” of electronic results changed the governor’s race outcome though no other races were affected. The paper ballots were sealed and never recounted.

The email to Rob Riley, from an unnamed US attorney, shared “frustration” of a “small group of like-minded conservative prosecutors” with the progress of investigating Siegelman. This evidence is still under seal by the Department of Justice.

But It adds weight to other opinions that the case had no legal justification. 113 former Attorneys General and Constitutional experts filed an Amicus Brief with the Supreme Court to hear Siegelman’s appeal, opining he’d committed no crime under law. Later, Siegelman’s request for a new trial, was based partially  discovery based evidence that Leura Canary, the US Attorney involved in Siegelman’s prosecution, was the wife of Bill Canary, who had worked with Rob Riley on Bob Riley’s 2002 campaign while Leura was investigating Siegelman. Siegelman’s indictment came in 2006, a month prior to the Democratic gubernatorial primary, which Siegelman had planned for his political comeback. Under indictment, he came in second.

Adam Zagorin of POGO writes: "New evidence related to one of the most controversial public corruption cases in recent years, the 2006 conviction of Alabama's former Democratic Governor...indicates that Department of Justice prosecutors...were thinking and acting in partisan terms when they probed the governor's administration."  Former Republican Attorney General of Arizona, Grant Woods, Co-Chair of John McCain’s presidential campaign, told CBS 60 Minutes,  “Don Siegelman was a Democrat they just couldn't beat fair and square,” John Farmer, then Dean of Rutgers Law School wrote, "Even Senator John McCain acknowledged ‘rewarding supporters to cushy jobs in the Caribbean is something both parties do.' Fine. But if this time-honored tradition of appointing ambassadors and other officials based largely on political support is so obviously permissible, the question that should trouble the president's conscience is why, if he is willing to make such appointments, he is also content to leave people like Don Siegelman in prison.”

Dana Siegelman carries these facts, and public outcry about the case, to Selma. She hopes to ask the President for a full Presidential Pardon due to the basic unfairness and political motivation of his trial.