Lobbyist: Baker consulted on PAC

Ex-senator paid for role, he says

Lobbyist Bruce Hawkins said under oath that the Little Rock attorney who created a political action committee that later contributed to Circuit Judge Michael Maggio's appeals-court campaign discussed matters relating to the PAC with former state Sen. Gilbert Baker, who was a paid consultant for Hawkins' lobbying firm last year.

Hawkins told Arkansas Ethics Commission staff members that Baker was a paid consultant under contract with Hawkins' firm, DBH Management Consultants, in 2013 and until May 15 of this year. Commission staff members interviewed Hawkins during its investigation of Maggio contributions from seven of eight PACs created in 2013 by lawyer Chris Stewart and financed largely by nursing-home owner Michael Morton of Fort Smith.

"No one contacted Mr. Hawkins about the Maggio campaign contributions; he learned about the two contributions from DBH2 [D. Bruce Hawkins 2] PAC through a newspaper article," according to a staff report summarizing witnesses' testimony that was submitted to the commission board.

The report, released Monday, does not directly quote any witnesses.

In June, the Ethics Commission fined Maggio $750 for accepting contributions above state limits.

The FBI and the Arkansas Judicial Discipline and Disability Commission also have been investigating the contributions. The judicial commission also is investigating online comments Maggio made anonymously about women, sex, race and a confidential adoption involving actress Charlize Theron.

Morton's PAC checks were dated July 8, 2013, the day Maggio held a hearing on whether to reduce a Faulkner County jury's $5.2 million judgment on May 16 against a Morton-owned nursing home in a lawsuit filed over the 2008 death of patient Martha Bull, 76. Three days after the hearing, Maggio cut the sum to $1 million.

Maggio withdrew from the appeals-court campaign on March 6, and the Arkansas Supreme Court later stripped him of all of his cases in the 20th Judicial Circuit.

Morton's Central Arkansas Nursing Centers Inc. gave the Hawkins PAC $3,000. On Dec. 5, 2013, the PAC gave Maggio $2,000. It later gave him an additional $1,000. The nursing-home company was originally a defendant in the lawsuit but was dismissed from it.

Hawkins told the Ethics Commission staff that "he has no knowledge as to how the ... [$3,000] contribution from [that company] was obtained. ... He did not solicit the contribution from Central Arkansas Nursing [Centers] or Mr. Morton," the report states.

"He [Hawkins] said that the only thing he knows is what Mr. Stewart told him, which was that the check [was] delivered to his office by a courier on July 19, 2013," the report adds. "Mr. Hawkins asked how the check was obtained, but Mr. Stewart did not give an answer as to the identity of the courier."

During an interview, also under oath with commission staff members, Stewart said he did not know who dropped off the checks but thinks it was either Baker "or someone who is related to Mr. Baker's firm like Linda Leigh Flanagin," the report states.

The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported Tuesday that Morton told the commission that his checks to the PACs were mailed to Baker's Conway home -- a statement supported by a FedEx delivery receipt. Morton said he had the checks written after Baker sent him a fax with monetary sums listed by each PAC name.

Hawkins said he first made contact with Stewart on July 19, 2012, when they discussed the possibility of setting up an additional PAC for Hawkins, who already had one PAC that has not been linked to the Maggio contention.

Hawkins said he gave Stewart $2,500 as a retainer fee but said Stewart didn't create a PAC for him in 2012.

In 2013, Stewart sent Hawkins another $2,500 invoice, Hawkins said. Hawkins showed ethics staff members a copy of both checks "to show his intent to start a PAC goes back to 2012 and was unrelated to the other PACs relevant to this case," the report says.

Hawkins said he and Stewart had no further discussions about starting the second PAC and that "Mr. Stewart instead discussed it with one of Mr. Hawkins' paid consultants from his lobbying firm, Mr. Gilbert Baker," the report says.

Hawkins told the staff members that he had authorized Baker "to communicate with Mr. Stewart on behalf of" the lobbying firm. "Mr. Hawkins was not purposely left out of the process, it is just Mr. Baker's role in the firm," the report says.

Hawkins also said that he doesn't know "for a fact what kind of conversations Mr. Baker and Mr. Stewart engaged in, [but] he thinks it is a good assumption that Mr. Baker helped Mr. Stewart come up with names" of recipients for campaign donations from the Hawkins PAC.

Hawkins said his company had a contract through May 15, 2014, with Baker's company. Baker's statement of financial interest for 2013 says he made more than $12,000 that year from LRM Consulting Inc., a lobbying company he created just before joining UCA as an administrator in January 2013.

Baker, who resigned from his administrative post at UCA shortly after contention surfaced over the PACs, did not list LRM on his conflict-of-interest form filed with UCA last year. It was, however, listed on his separate statement of financial interest for 2013 and says only that he made more than $12,000, the highest amount asked about on the form. It is listed as a business investment or holding rather than as a source of income.

After reading about the Maggio donations, Hawkins said he set up a meeting with Stewart on March 31 "to ask him a multitude of questions to find out exactly what happened when the PAC was established, including who established it, who is in charge of the PAC, and when were the checks deposited," the report says.

According to the report, Hawkins said he was "very upset and irritated at the time of his meeting with Mr. Stewart. ... Stewart said that the instructions to set up the PAC were given to him by" Baker.

Hawkins said that he and Stewart never talked in 2013. "The PAC has Mr. Hawkins' name on it but it seems that a lot of the instructions for Mr. Stewart came from Mr. Baker," the report says.

Stewart, also testifying under oath, told the commission staff that he registered the eight PACs at issue because his client, Baker, was interested in forming them. In this effort, Stewart said he represented Baker's consulting firm and the payments to Stewart's law firm came from that company, the report states.

While Baker was paying him a $1,500 retainer fee monthly for other, unrelated work, the only compensation Stewart said he got for the PACs was a $500 administrative fee per PAC.

When commission staff members asked Baker "if he supplied money to set up the PACs, he said he did not know," the report says. "He [Baker] said he was always getting invoices from Mr. Stewart. ... Baker would go to Chris Stewart for any number of legal needs. He said he is a very generous person and Mr. Stewart was always in need and he would not blink an eye in paying an invoice Mr. Stewart sent him."

Stewart told the staff members that, to his knowledge, "when the PACs were formed, Judge Maggio was not supposed to be connected with the PACs in any way," the report relates.

Morton has said he had thought the PAC money he donated would ultimately go to Maggio.

Maggio, who testified under oath on June 4, said he and Baker never discussed the pending lawsuit against Morton's nursing home.

The staff report says Maggio "thinks that the timing of the checks to the PACs is an unfortunate coincidence."

The report adds: "He [Maggio] does not know why they [the PACs] were formed or who formed them and does not care about their formation. He said he has nothing to do with them nor did he ever talk about them with anyone.

"He [Maggio] did not expect to gain any contributions from any nursing homes because of that lawsuit" against Morton's nursing home, the report says.

"However, he [Maggio] [had] discussed with [campaign consultant Clint] Reed and Mr. Baker that the nursing home industry would be a good source of contributions," the report adds. Maggio said he never directed anyone to get nursing-home money, though.

A Democrat-Gazette analysis earlier this year found that two nursing-home chains accounted for almost half of the $58,650 given to Maggio's campaign.

In a text message Tuesday, former U.S. Attorney Bud Cummins, who represents Baker, said the Ethics Commission report "amply demonstrates that the coincidental timing of certain contributions was just that, a coincidence."

"To my knowledge, no informed person has suggested otherwise," Cummins added.

Cummins did not answer a question about how much money Hawkins' lobbying firm paid Baker in 2013. Hawkins did not return a phone message seeking comment.

Baker did not mention his paid work for Hawkins on a conflict-of-interest form he completed for UCA in late January 2013.

A section on 07/30/2014

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