Lobbyist convicted of Kentucky deputy attorney general bribe
LEXINGTON, Ky. — A Democratic lobbyist has been convicted of bribing Kentucky’s No. 2 law enforcement officer in a case voters are likely to see in political ads for next year’s race for governor.
A federal jury said James Sullivan was trying to bribe Deputy Attorney General Tim Longmeyer in March of 2016 when he put $1,000 in the cup holder of Longmeyer’s SUV in the parking lot of a Panera Bread restaurant. At the time, Sullivan was trying to get the attorney general’s office to hire some outside law firms to represent the state in proposed litigation. But Longmeyer had already been busted by the FBI on unrelated charges, and he recorded the exchange with a camera hidden in a day planner.
“I’ll do more if I can just get something going,” Sullivan told Longmeyer in the recording. “I just hope we can be successful going down the road together.”
Longmeyer was the chief deputy for Attorney General Andy Beshear, who is a potential Democratic candidate for governor in 2019 when Republican Gov. Matt Bevin can run for re-election. Authorities said Beshear did not know about the bribe, but that has not stopped Bevin and his GOP allies from using it to portray Beshear’s office as corrupt. The trial also exposed details of Longmeyer’s scheme to collect hundreds of thousands of dollars in kickbacks from a state contract involving the employee health insurance plan. Much of that money was funneled to Democratic political candidates.