The scheme was complex, with piles of tax money flowing out of Jefferson County to a youth baseball league, then to a dance team that prosecutors say never participated, and finally into personal bank accounts, credit cards and mortgage payments.
That’s according to the case prepared by federal prosecutors, who are citing three key people behind the recent scandal. But so far, the prosecutor’s office has charged only one. Fred Plump last month resigned his seat in the state legislature and pleaded guilty to federal charges of conspiracy and obstruction of justice. He is due to appear in federal court in Birmingham later this month for sentencing.
Now, the details of Plump’s plea agreement, as well as AL.com interviews with some of those involved, shed light on how it all worked.
The plea agreement that Plump signed on May 18 referred to two other figures involved in the bribery scheme — “Legislator #1” and “Individual #1” — but did not identify them by name.
The other lawmaker named in the plea agreement is Congressman John Rogers, who identified himself to AL.com as “Legislator #1” when federal prosecutors announced the charges against Plump. Prosecutors alleged, and Plump said in his plea agreement, that the lawmaker funneled tax money to Plump’s Major League Baseball as “part of the conspiracy.”
Rogers has repeatedly told AL.com that he did nothing wrong and received no money.
The third figure, referred to in the plea agreement as “Individual #1,” is a legislative aide to Rogers. Rogers identified her as his longtime personal assistant, Varie Johnson.
“I trust her, and whatever Fred and her did, that’s their business. I don’t know anything about that,” Rogers, D-Birmingham, told AL.com. “He has to do what he has to do with it. If he doesn’t, he’s in trouble. I guarantee you I didn’t do anything.
Johnson has not been charged with wrongdoing. She did not return calls or respond to messages from AL.com for this article.
Richard Jaffe, the Birmingham attorney representing Plump in the federal case, said he did not dispute that Johnson was “Individual No. 1” as listed in the plea agreement. AL.com also confirmed Johnson as the “#1 Person” in interviews with three other sources.
Although she is not listed as a legislative staffer in state records, Rogers told AL.com that she hires Johnson and pays her privately to help him with both public and private matters.
“She handles all my affairs, my care and everything,” Rogers said. “I pay her. The state doesn’t pay her.”
Rogers said that sometimes when he is busy or unavailable, he has Johnson handle his legislative business, such as signing his name to documents. The 82-year-old lawmaker said he suffers from hip problems and that Johnson is also his “caretaker,” giving him rides and helping him with daily tasks.
“She works for me,” Rogers said. “I let her sign my name. I give her permission.
Rogers said he never misused public money.
Read more: John Rogers has been a target of the feds for 35 years. He is not afraid
Plump, a Birmingham Democrat and longtime youth sports coach, won the 2022 seat to serve in the Alabama House of Representatives.
Federal court filings now say Plump, beginning about three years before he took office, conspired to defraud and obtain money by funneling public dollars through his nonprofit and returning some of it. The financing transactions began in March 2019 and continued through April 2023, according to Plump’s agreement.
The money came from something called the Jefferson County Community Service Fund, a pool of tax money to support local causes. The fund was created by the state Legislature in 2015 to allow the Jefferson County Commission to collect a 1 percent sales tax and use tax so local lawmakers can allocate about $3.6 million annually to schools , libraries, police departments and youth sports. The fund began awarding grants in 2018. After the legislature recommends a group receive funding, a committee reviews and approves the grants.
Here’s how the bribery scheme worked under Plump’s settlement: Legislator #1, whom Rogers identified as himself, recommended that the fund send money to Plump’s Major League Baseball. Plump then submitted falsified budgets to the fund committee and, after committee approval, Legislator #1’s assistant delivered the fund checks to Plump.
Then, according to the plea agreement, Plump wrote another check for half of his Major League Baseball money to the assistant, whom Rogers identified as Johnson. The checks typically said they were for the “dance team” or “cheerleaders,” according to the plea agreement. But the assistant didn’t provide dancers or cheerleaders for league events, and Plump knew she didn’t need money for a dance team, his settlement states.
In all, Plump wrote 10 checks to the assistant totaling more than $196,000, according to the plea agreement. The assistant deposited the checks from Plump’s Major League Baseball account, named Piper Davis, into personal accounts and used the money for cash, as well as mortgage and credit card payments, the plea agreement states.
The plea agreement also said Legislator #1, who Rogers identified as himself, should get some of the money.
“When the Committee issued the check to Piper Davis, Person #1 delivered the check to Plump and Plump wrote a check to Person #1,” the plea agreement states. “Individual #1 told Plump they needed half, meaning Plump had to give half of the money to Legislator #1 and Individual #1’s Fund.”
“Plump agreed to pay bribes from fund money directed to Piper Davis by Legislator #1,” the plea agreement continues. “Plump realized that if he didn’t give them half the money, the #1 lawmaker wasn’t going to funnel money to Piper Davis.”
Rogers recommended that approximately 80 percent of his community service fund funds go to Plump Major League Baseball, according to community service fund records. He did so on forms that required him to certify that he had asked for “nothing of value” in exchange for the referral and that the use of the funds would meet legal purposes.
Rodgers has given $497,000 since 2018, and of that, nearly $386,000 has gone to Plump Major League Baseball, according to fund records. After the first year of disbursement from the fund, it distributed funds to only a few other recipients, Hoover High School, the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame and the Birmingham City League.
“It was part of the conspiracy that Legislator #1 recommended and recommended in each fiscal year that the majority of the fund money allocated by him be paid to Piper Davis,” the plea agreement states.
Jaffe said his client Plump did not personally benefit from the misuse of the grant money.
“I’ve read several accounts that Coach Plump has personally benefited from some of that revenue by putting it into his personal accounts, and that’s completely false and untrue,” Jaffe told AL.com. “All the money he received, other than what he illegally paid for a dance program he should have known didn’t exist, went to the Piper Davis 501c3 charity benefiting minority youth through baseball programs.” He personally hasn’t earned a dime, and any accounts to the contrary are wrong.
With his guilty plea to federal charges of conspiracy and obstruction of justice, Plump faces up to 20 years in federal prison, plus a fine of up to $250,000 for each count. Plump agreed to repay at least $200,000 to the Jefferson County Community Service Fund as part of the plea agreement.
As for broader questions about the scheme, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney in Birmingham did not respond to a request for comment.
As for the employment agreement between Rogers and Johnson, legal and ethics experts told AL.com that mixing personal and professional ties presents ethical issues.
Jim Sumner, the retired longtime director of the Alabama Ethics Commission, said private officials should not conduct public business because they cannot be held accountable the way public officials are.
“That would concern me greatly because one would think that a public servant would want someone who is accountable to the public to be the person who acts at their behest,” Sumner told AL.com.
He said it is not unheard of for government officials to have their aides act on their behalf or even sign on behalf of the official. But that raises ethical concerns, he said, when those assistants aren’t government employees covered by ethics laws.
In the State House, most legislators typically share assistantships among a pool of clerks who are publicly employed by the state. But Rogers said he employed Johnson privately for many years, paying her with his own money to handle both legislative and personal business.
Susan Pace Hamill, a law professor at the University of Alabama, said there’s nothing wrong with a lawmaker hiring a personal valet under the right circumstances. Problems arise when government money is misused to finance personal needs, she said.
“If Rep. Rogers is really using his own money, money that he’s earned from his salary as a state legislator or a legitimate business on the side, and some of that money is being used to pay for this assistance, I have no problem with that,” said Hamill, former an MP candidate whose legal focus includes ethics. “Politicians have access to funds that are not technically part of the government payroll, but they have restrictions on how they can use them.”