Deseret News | A.G.'s office may probe Hughes

A.G.'s office may probe Hughes

By Bob Bernick Jr. and Arthur Raymond
Deseret News

Published: Friday, Oct. 3, 2008 12:47 a.m. MDT

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The Utah Attorney General's office said Thursday that its investigators may look into any alleged criminal acts in a state House ethics complaint filed against Rep. Greg Hughes, R-Draper.

Meanwhile, regardless of any law enforcement probe, House Democrats want a "thorough" House ethics investigation of Hughes and want it even if Hughes decides not to fight the charges and resigns.

Hughes won't resign, he says, and demands a thorough investigation as well, believing he will be "completely exonerated."

"Nothing will stop me from getting before the ethics committee — I will expose this for what it is," Hughes said, calling it a cheap political attack aimed at derailing his re-election.

Chief deputy attorney general Kirk Torgensen told the newspaper that he offered one of the complainants 18 months ago that his office would look into any formal complaint she may want to file against Hughes. The complaint never came.

Torgensen said Thursday that that offer is still on the table, adding that his office could get involved in the investigation, whether the original complainant — former GOP Rep. Susan Lawrence — makes contact with them or not.

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Meanwhile, Rep. Phil Riesen, D-Millcreek, says he did indeed leak an ethics complaint against Hughes to KSL-TV, and says he has nothing to apologize for and broke no House ethics rules in doing so. "I made the complaint public 18 hours or so before it was filed. It was important that the public know. And I didn't violate any confidentiality agreement" with Lawrence, who in a written letter that is part of the complaint says Hughes offered her a $50,000 campaign donation if she would switch and vote for private school vouchers. "Susan's letter is addressed 'to whom it may concern,"' said Riesen. "So it was perfectly right to share it with anyone."

After news broke that there likely would be an ethics investigation of Hughes, Hughes and two other Republicans, Reps. Brad Dee, R-Ogden, and Kevin Garn, R-Layton, filed an ethics complaint Wednesday morning against Riesen, claiming he broke ethics rules by releasing an unfiled ethics complaint against Hughes and asking for an investigation of Hughes in order to clear Hughes' name.

Later Wednesday, Riesen and two House Democrats, Roz McGee, D-Salt Lake, and Neil Hansen, D-Ogden, filed a lengthy ethics complaint against Hughes. It repeated the Lawrence charge and basically claimed that Hughes strong-armed lobbyists to make contributions to his pro-voucher political issues campaign, browbeat lobbyists not to support GOP candidates who were challenging him, Rep. Glenn Donnelson, R-North Ogden, and Rep. Aaron Tilton, R-Springville, (Hughes won his GOP nomination, Donnelson and Tilton lost), and warning lobbyists who didn't play along that their bills could suffer in the House Rules Committee, where Hughes is the current vice chairman and could become chairman if he wins re-election this year.