Stevens Found Guilty on All 7 Counts

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Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens (R) remained resolute Monday afternoon even as a federal jury declared him guilty on seven counts of filing false financial statements to conceal gifts worth more than $250,000.

“It’s not over yet,” Stevens said, grabbing his daughter Beth by the arm and exiting the courtroom flanked by bodyguards and his defense team.

The Alaska Senator is scheduled to return to the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Feb. 25, when Judge Emmet Sullivan will hear any outstanding motions and set a sentencing date.

The Republican’s trial ended Monday, after six weeks in court that included scores of photos of his Girdwood, Alaska, home; audiotape conversations; letters to and from the Senator and testimony from a cast of Alaska workers, Stevens’ friends and family, and the lawmaker himself.

As the 12-member jury’s foreman read the verdict Monday — a unanimous guilty verdict that could carry a sentence of up to five years on each count — Stevens’ head hung down.

Afterward in the courthouse hallway, Stevens was surrounded by his defense team, as lead attorney Brendan Sullivan kept one hand on Stevens’ shoulder.

Neither Stevens nor his attorneys answered questions about a possible appeal, whether he will resign his Senate seat or the future of his re-election campaign.

“I’m going home from here,” Stevens said as he exited an elevator on his way to a van parked at the courthouse curb.

Inside the van, Stevens slouched on the far side of the vehicle’s first bench, while a camera lens outside pressed up against the tinted glass over his left shoulder.

In the meantime, as lead federal prosecutor Brenda Morris walked across the courthouse’s fourth floor after the verdict, a half-dozen of her colleagues reached out to shake her hand and pat her on the back.

Morris and a Justice Department spokeswoman did not comment on the case before entering a courthouse office.

As the door closed, however, the diminutive prosecutor could be seen celebrating as she stood on tiptoe to accept bear hugs from her colleagues.

“This has been a long and hard-fought trial,” Matthew Friedrich, acting Assistant Attorney General of the Justice Department’s criminal division, said at a press conference after the verdict.

Despite the apparent celebration in the wake of the verdict, the prosecution suffered many setbacks throughout the trial, and by Monday afternoon the case had appeared to be in jeopardy.

In a note to the judge, the jury pointed out that there was an error in the indictment.

The indictment says that on his 2001 financial disclosure form, the Senator made a false statement when he checked the “no” box next to the question, “Did you, your spouse or dependent child receive any reportable gift in the reporting period?”

But Stevens did not check “no”; he checked “yes.”

The indictment goes on to say Stevens did not file the attachment on which gifts are reported, but he did. His disclosure form for that year includes a gift roster with one entry, disclosing a commemorative Special Olympics coin worth $1,100 in honor of Stevens’ service as honorary chairman of the 2000 Olympic Games.

A little before noon, the jury sent a question to Judge Sullivan noting that Stevens’ 2001 disclosure form has the gift question “checked as yes. On the indictment it says he checked no. These items do not correspond. What do we do?”

Prosecutor Nicholas Marsh suggested that the erroneous language in the indictment was simply “a typo,” which did not affect the underlying premise of the charges — that Stevens accepted tens of thousands of dollars worth of gifts from his friends, particularly major renovations of his home conducted by employees of the now-defunct oil services firm VECO and its Chief Executive Officer Bill Allen.