{"id":4438,"date":"2009-04-05T23:29:00","date_gmt":"2009-04-06T05:29:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/04\/gripgate-probe-widens-with-sec-involvement\/"},"modified":"2009-04-05T23:29:00","modified_gmt":"2009-04-06T05:29:00","slug":"gripgate-probe-widens-with-sec-involvement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/04\/gripgate-probe-widens-with-sec-involvement\/","title":{"rendered":"GRIPgate probe widens with SEC involvement"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The federal investigation into GRIPgate, the controversy surrounding the $1.6 billion transportation project, has been expanded as staffers from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission<\/a> have been brought into the probe, the Albuquerque Journal<\/a> is reporting.<\/p>\n

SEC involvement, according to the Journal, \u201cwould indicate investigators have widened their scope to include possible securities fraud as well as the widely reported pay-to-play allegations.\u201d Basically, what CDR Financial Products<\/a> did for the state and how much it was paid is now of interest to investigators.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s in addition to the pay-to-play allegations — that the administration of Gov. Bill Richardson<\/a> traded a lucrative state bond contract for $110,000 in contributions to Richardson\u2019s political committees and his 2006 gubernatorial campaign.<\/p>\n

The SEC team includes Denver enforcement division attorney Allison Lee, who, the Journal article states, \u201cw<\/span>as part of the SEC enforcement team that successfully brought civil charges against former Richardson insider and state Game Commission Chairman Guy Riordan<\/a>.<\/p>\n

From the Journal:<\/p>\n

\n

\n

\u201cRiordan was barred from the securities industry and ordered to repay the state $2.2 million for paying bribes to former state Treasurer Michael Montoya to get state investment business.<\/p>\n

The case against Riordan was a civil proceeding, and he was never charged with a crime. Montoya pleaded guilty in connection with other kickback allegations and is in a federal prison.<\/p>\n

Riordan said publicly during the SEC hearing that he believed the case against him was really a \u2018witch hunt\u2019 aimed at Richardson, who fired Riordan from the Game Commission when he was implicated by Montoya\u2019s testimony in the trial of another former treasurer, Robert Vigil.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

The Journal article states that the pace of the CDR probe has \u201cbeen picking up in recent weeks.\u201d That could be in part because the statute of limitations might be approaching later this month for some of the potential crimes being investigated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The federal investigation into GRIPgate, the controversy surrounding the $1.6 billion transportation project, has been expanded as staffers from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission have been brought into the probe, the Albuquerque Journal is reporting. SEC involvement, according to the Journal, \u201cwould indicate investigators have widened their scope to include possible securities fraud as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4438","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4438","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4438"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4438\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4438"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4438"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4438"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}