Jan 5, 2009 6:28 pm US/Eastern
Grand Jury In City Hall Probe To Expire
BALTIMORE (WJZ) ―
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Time is running out for the latest grand jury investigating corruption at Baltimore's City Hall.
CBS
Time is running out for the latest grand jury investigating corruption at Baltimore's City Hall. With just days to go in their term, grand jurors have not indicted Mayor Dixon on any criminal charges, despite embarrassing leaks in the case and a raid on her home.
Mike Hellgren takes an inside look at what's next in this ongoing probe.
This is one of several grand juries called in the investigation; others have had their terms expire. The mayor says she has done nothing wrong and will survive.
The next few days will be critical for Mayor Dixon and the state prosecutor's investigation into City Hall corruption. The grand jury looking into the case expires Friday, although there's no time limit for the prosecutor to bring charges.
"When you've got a potential indictment, especially of a public profile person, they're going to cross all their t's and dot all their i's before bringing it," said law professor Byron Warnken.
By the end of the week, the jurors could indict the mayor. If they don't, it could end the probe or the prosecutor could call another grand jury, which would require circuit court approval and the prosecutor would have to start over with new jurors.
"But that's what I have to do if I don't know enough for certain to indict now or to drop the case," Warnken said.
The investigation started in 2006--when Dixon was City Council president--with her former campaign manager. The city paid his company thousands of dollars to work on the City Council's computers with no contract. Investigators also looked at Dixon's votes on contracts that financially benefitted her sister's employer.
"In my heart, I did nothing intentionally in any of this," Dixon said at the time.
It heated up again last year when the prosecutor's office raided the mayor's home. Court documents revealed the prosecutor was looking at the mayor's relationship with developer Ron Lipscomb, including whether he gave her gifts that she never reported in exchange for her votes on the Board of Estimates on tax breaks and zoning for his company's projects. The mayor and Lipscomb denied any wrongdoing.
"I would love to have a timely resolution to this because this is really clouding a lot of good work that's going on," Dixon said last June.
But that may not happen.
"They could bring it 20 years from now," Warnken said. "My suspicion is they're not going to seek an indictment unless they think they've got the case."
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