WSB's Veronica Waters reports during a nearly daylong cross-examination, Dewey Clark, who lived in the basement apartment at Campbell's home for six years, wavered on some of the details about the where, when and how of two cash payoffs he says he witnessed a contractor give Campbell. Yet Clark insisted that the two occasions in which he claims Campbell got $10,000 and $4,000 actually happened.

Clark testified that over several months, he passed $50,000 in bribes from strip club owner Michael Childs to the mayor so Campbell would get Childs a liquor license. As Clark talked about the process he and Childs had gone through to bribe members of the License Review Board, he said couldn't recall details about the payments or how much he paid an activist to speak out at a board meeting on behalf of granting the license.

"It's been about seven years," Clark said. "I just don't remember."

The defense pressed Clark hard on why, if he had given Campbell this money, Childs never got the license he wanted. Clark explained that Campbell had bowed to political pressure to scuttle the license after there had been a fatal shooting at another of Childs' clubs.

Clark admitted he was angry at Campbell for not giving Childs the liquor permit.

"I didn't think it was right that Mayor Campbell should take his money and not give him a license," said Clark.

Defense attorney Jerry Froelich repeatedly quizzed Clark on the numerous statements he'd given federal agents since the first time he was interviewed in 1999. Froelich asked why Clark, who says he resigned from City Hall that year and went to work for Childs, had never told the FBI about the bribery allegations.

Clark says he decided to tell the feds about the alleged bribery after he read a newspaper story saying Childs had been planning to have Campbell beat up to "send a message" to the next mayor. Clark says he wanted to explain why his friend Childs was so angry at Campbell. Childs was taped offering an informant $20,000 to "mess up" Campbell.

Clark denied being tutored by government representatives in the 16 hours he spent prepping for his testimony, and said "I honestly don't remember" when he was asked if he was shown any documents in the meetings he'd had with prosecutors over the past two weeks.

Wednesday, 1 February 2006