Welcome to Criminalia, a production of Shondaland Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio.
This is a story of a Texas oil tycoon, a congressman from Idaho, and a financial commodities broker in Oklahoma City, and is the story of blackmail, Yes, but it's also a story of political corruption and ethics uncovered by that blackmail. There's a lot going on here and almost everyone is guilty. Welcome to Criminalia. I'm Maria Tremarky.
And I'm Holly Frye. Let's meet this trio. We're going to start with the Texan tycoon. It was estimated that Nelson bunker Hunt was worth between eight billion and sixteen billion dollars, yes, billion with a B. Hunt was a Texas oil company executive who also owned one thousands, drove a Cadillac, and lost most of his fortune when he and two of his brothers, William, Herbert and Lamar tried to corner the market in silver. Quote A billion dollars ain't what it used to be, he famously said. After
the collapse. Early in nineteen eighty one, bunker Hunt received a blackmail letter demanding he paid four hundred and forty thousand dollars in exchange for the blackmailer's silence about an eighty seven thousand dollars bribe that Hunt had arranged for Idaho Republican Representative George Hanson in the form of a silver futures purchase for his wife, Connie Hanson, but actually intended to line the pockets of her politician husband.
George Hanson served in the United States House of Representatives for fourteen years, representing Idaho's second district between nineteen sixty five and nineteen sixty nine, and then again from nineteen seventy five nineteen eighty five. He was, as reported by The New York Times, known for his quote flamboyant's impulsiveness, affability, and tireless campaigning. He was also a convicted swindler.
The third major player in this story is the blackmailer, a man named Arthur Greenhill Emmons. The third Arthur was an Oklahoma commodity's brokerage employee at the trading firm Mingen Company that was where Connie Hanson had made a profit of eighty seven thousand dollars speculating in silver in nineteen
seventy nine. Hunt had recommended the firm to the Hansons and Emmons always believed that Hunt set up the silver deal as a way of funneling bribe money to George Hanson, although he could not prove it.
Outraged about the blackmail letter, Hunt's first instinct was to report it to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Hanson, though hearing of the blackmailer's letter, instead insisted it reported to the Justice Department as he held political office, and then the whole time he was insistent that he was innocent of any financial wrongdoing. That led Emmons, worried he'd be exposed as a blackmailer by the Department of Justice, to send a second letter to Bunker Hunt, asking him to
just forget about the whole thing. He signed it as he had the first letter with the alias Gordon Warner. The FBI, which is the department that handles such cases, didn't forget about the whole thing and tracked him down, and Arthur turned himself in.
Emmons pleaded guilty to a single count of blackmail for trying to demand money and threatening to tell the FBI that he discovered Hunt had bribed Representative George Hansen circuitously through his wife, Connie Emmon's attorney, James Lyons, refused to comment on the case to the press, simply stating that
his client was quote extremely remorseful. The Washington Post reported Slash speculated at the time that Emmon's blackmail attempt was likely because Hunt had allegedly caused wild fluctuations in silver prices in January of nineteen eighty fluctuations that financially hurt a lot of small investors.
Because Emmens cooperated with the government, he was granted immunity from prosecution. He received a suspended one year sentence and was fined two thousand dollars, but the investigation didn't stop with him. It opened questions and authorities began to look at the nature of the relationship between the Texas billionaire
and the politician, and they found a bombshell. Hansen had made false statements on his congressional financial disclosure forms, including that eighty seven thousand dollars that Emmons noted in his blackmail letter to Hunt.
These disclosure forms were part of the Ethics and Government Act, a federal law enacted in nineteen seventy eight, passed in the wake of the Nixon Watergate scandal. Under the law, all major government officials are required to file annual financial disclosure statements of their sources of income. That law remains in place today, and it includes one amounts of income, gifts and reimbursements, two the identity and approximate value of
property held and liabilities owed. Three transactions in property, commodities and securities, and for financial interests of a spouse or dependent. It excludes the reporting of sources of political campaign funds, including campaign receipts and expenditures. Campaign reporting falls under a separate law.
Lawyers for Hunt and Hanson took swift action six days after the blackmail attempt. Hunt's lawyers had Connie Hansen sign notes for each loan in question. The loans they felt needed to be clearly listed in Connie's name, and this extra step was assurance they were. According to federal prosecutor read Winegarden, the real motive for it was that Hunt and Hanson quote wanted to get their ducks in a row.
We're going to take a break here for a word from our sponsors, and when we return, we'll talk in detail about what Hanson didn't disclose and why he thought he didn't have to.
Welcome back to Criminalia George Hanson was charged for failing to comply with the Ethics Act, and he was indicted and went to trial. So let's talk about what went on in that courtroom.
George Hanson was indicted by a federal grand jury in April of nineteen eighty one and tried on charges that he failed to disclose four major financial transactions, including one an eighty seven thousand, four hundred seventy five dollars profit on the purchase and sale of one hundred twenty five silver futures contracts over a two day period in nineteen seventy nine. Two A fifty thousand dollars personal loan in Connie Hanson's name from a Dallas bank co signed by
Hunt in nineteen seventy eight. Three, A sixty one thousand, five hundred three dollars and forty two cents loan directly from Bunker Hunt in nineteen eighty two, Connie Hanson, and four personal loans totaling one hundred thirty five thousand dollars in nineteen eighty one by individuals in Virginia. Feeling surprisingly optimistic about his case, Hanson stated things quote could be over before it starts. They were not.
On the first day of trial, Bunker, Hunt testified that he had lent money and given financial advice to Connie Hanson, but only after George Hansen had assured him that the couple had made separate financial arrangements. He stated he had quote some reservations about giving money directly to a politician, but that Hanson had convinced him it would be quote all right to help Connie make some money.
Hunt, who described himself on the stand as quote largely self employed, testified for more than two hours. Federal prosecutor Weingarten questioned him about his dealings with the Hansons and if he had dealt only with Connie Hanson as a quote way to provide George Hanson money and not get yourself in trouble, to which Hunt replied, quote, I wouldn't put it that strongly. I was trying to help the
Hanson family with the problems they had. As to how these two men knew each other, Hunt testified that Hanson had approached him a few years earlier, in nineteen seventy eight, after they had met at a dinner function. Hanson had confided that he needed contributions to overcome between three hundred thousand and four hundred thousand dollars in debts resulting from his congressional campaign, as well as the cost of his defense against charges that he had violated federal campaign laws.
In nineteen seventy five.
The prosecution discovered that Hanson and his wife had signed a financial separation agreement dividing their property, which we mentioned earlier, but they also discovered the couple didn't really play by those rules. They had continued to keep everything in both their names and filed joint tax returns. In addition, lawyers for the prosecution traced the loans in question through a network of banks to prove Hanson one hundred percent knew about transactions in his wife's name and that he had
benefited from them. Addressing the jury, federal prosecutor James Cole stated that Hanson had intentionally hidden transactions by filing false statements and that quote, the evidence will show that he knew they were a false and he and tended them to be false when he filed them. Spoiler alert it did.
During the trial, it came to light that with a bit of sleight of hand, the eighty seven thousand dollars, which was actually eighty seven thousand, four hundred seventy five dollars profit from the silver contracts had been suspiciously run through two banks. Connie testified that the money was used to pay off loans, but she could not recall what loans.
The Hunt backed fifty thousand dollars bank loan was intended for Connie to cover a thirty three thousand, eight hundred and fifty five dollars loss on a nineteen seventy seven soybeans commodities deal, a deal that the Hunt family had also lost money in. Connie Hanson, though, failed to repay that loan, and when the bank collected from Hunt, her co signer, he then sought to get his money back with interest, a total of sixty one thousand, five hundred
three dollars from the Hansons. These loans and the silver contracts, they were all in Connie's name, a fact the prosecution used to show that Representative Hanson knew exactly what he was doing, and that was hiding money.
Hanson's explanation for the one hundred and thirty five thousand dollars loan was that the money, at least in part, was for the Association of Concerned Taxpayers, a group that promoted his book criticizing the Internal Revenue Service. He later explained that he didn't declare it on his nineteen eighty two financial disclosure statements because he claimed the money was given to an organization he created and headed to promote
his tax legislation and related book. He had, though, reported the interest on his income tax returns, which were filed jointly with his wife. John Mead Junior, a former Southern Virginia banker who was himself later convicted of embezzlement, testified he had lent Hanson fifty thousand dollars on November twenty first,
nineteen eighty one. Now, this was also part of the one hundred and thirty five thousand dollars in question, so he meant it while he was trying to rally support to convince the United States Army to explore research into hydrogen cars. The loan, Meat also stated was intended to help Hanson promote a book he was writing about Iran.
Defense layer Stephen Braga argued the government's evidence was immaterial to the charges and that it failed to prove Hanson was calling the shots for his wife's financial dealings. Another of Hanson's attorneys, Nathan Lewin called the congressman a quote man of limited means who had quote an enormous personal debt of nearly four hundred thousand dollars and that he
was in a quote terrible financial bind. He argued that Hanson wasn't trying to hide anything and highlighted that it was on an attorney's advice that he and his wife had drawn up an agreement to separate their finances. When Hanson filed the disclosure statements, Lewyn explained, quote he thought those loans had been the property of missus Hanson, and we're therefore not reportable on the forms.
So on that we're going to take a break for a word from our sponsors. When we're back, we'll talk more about Hanson's trial.
Welcome back to Criminalia. Guilty not guilty, Let's find out.
As we talked about earlier in the show, the Ethics and Government Act requires Congressmen and other high ranking government officials to file annual reports disclosing their income and other financial transactions. Hanson's attorneys claimed his omissions from the Ethics Disclosure Statements were not a willful violation of any law because Congress did not intend to use those statements for anything,
but the jury didn't buy that. A United State's District Court jury, which was sequestered in a local motel during the trial, deliberated for three and a half hours and found the congressman guilty on all four counts.
Hanson was the first public official to be tried for violating the Ethics and Government Act, and if he was convicted, he was facing a maximum of five years in prison and a ten thousand dollars fine for each charge. He was found guilty of four counts of filing false financial disclosure statements.
In June of nineteen eighty four, United States District Court Judge Joyce Hens Green sentenced Hansen to serve five to fifteen months in prison and find him forty thousand dollars for filing false financial disclosure forms to Congress in direct violation of the nineteen seventy eight Ethics in Government Act. Hanson could have been reprimanded, censured, or expelled from office, and Green told him that she based his quote deterrence,
setting an example, punishment, rehabilitation, and justice. At his sentencing, Hanson stated, quote, there was no theft, no scandalous stuffing of money, into a politician's pocket. There was no kick back from the staff or misuse of public funds. There was no active drunkenness, no act of violence, no accident leaving someone dead or injured. Hanson's lawyer, Lewin stated to the press that he planned on filing for a new trial on grounds that quote errors were made in the proceedings.
After his trial, Hanson accused the Justice Department of singling him out for prosecution because he had criticized their department, as he had the Internal Revenue Service. In a letter to the House Standards of Official Conduct Committee, Hanson accused Special Counsel Stanley Brand, who conducted the ethics investigation, of having a quote direct conflict of interest, and wrote, quote confidence in the non partisan deliberations of your committee has
been destroyed. Hanson also stated in his letter that Brand, who was general counsel for the House of Representatives before he entered private practice, was on retainer to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee during the investigation, and that was a conflict. Brand did work for the campaign on quote a limited matter, but he had disclosed that to the Ethics panel, and it was a non issue.
Federal Prosecutor Winegarden stated that Hanson quote took great care to hide very suspicious and potentially embarrassing transactions. In his closing arguments addressing the jury, he stated that Hanson was using his wife as a quote front for concealing his financial dealings with Bunker Hunt. Winegarden called the financial separation agreement quote phony and something that Hanson's used to avoid the legal requirements of the Ethics Act, yet not when
it came to time to pay their taxes. He also argued that Hanson's actions quote, when exposed to the fresh air, emit an odor that can be picked up all the way from Pocatello. It was not an odor of spring flowers, but the stench of political corruption. Hanson, he continued, quote, went to great lengths to hide that stench from his colleagues on the hill, the press, and from the good people of Idaho.
Defense attorney Lewin, who strongly believed that Wingarten brought the indictment against Hanson for quote personal ambition, said after the verdict that the impending appeal would cover a quote whole range of issues involved in what he called quote an injustice. Lewin also stated that he believed that jury sequestration had led to quote an unfair verdict. Hanson stated that he didn't blame the jury for that, but that the quote smokescreen made by the Justice Department obscured the facts for
the jury. I consider myself innocence. Prosecutors Weingarten and Cole stated they were quote satisfied justice was done.
So despite all this, Hanson ran for reelection that year while appealing his conviction, and he lost only by one hundred and sixty seven votes. Instead of serving in public office, he served a year in federal prison. Actually he served six months and then another six months for violating his parole. In nineteen ninety five, after many appeals, the charges against
him were dismissed by the Supreme Court. This wasn't Hanson's first time in the courtroom, though, he was convicted in nineteen seventy five of election law violations, and it also wasn't his last. He was subsequently convicted in an entirely different case on forty five counts of bank fraud, for which he was incarcerated for forty months. In nineteen ninety two, Hanson was also convicted and incarcerated on charges of defrauding too Idaho banks and two hundred people in a thirty
million dollar investment scheme. In true Hanson form, he denied he'd done anything wrong and claimed the accusations against him were nothing more than a government vendetta, which we've heard a couple other times from him.
Who Hanson, do you want to have a sip of something yummy to wash the taste of all of this out of our mouths?
Yes? I do?
Okay. This one was actually tricky for me to think about, because I was like, how do I want to approach this. I thought about a few different things. I looked at, like lists of crops in Texas, of things we might include the usual stuff that I.
Do, right, what goes on in Idaho? Kind of do something with potato?
Yeah, don't worry, there's going to be a potato, but it's optional. And then it occurred to me like what kind of drinks were people drinking in the seventies when this actual criminal activity was going on? And what popped into my mind was the Harvey wallbank.
Oh, I haven't heard thought of this drink in a long time.
Here's the thing about a Harvey wallbanger. I think if you're you know, I remember when we are of an age where we heard about it as kids. And I don't know about you, but to me it sounded like a badass what a name, right, That's a masculine hard drink.
And actually don't think I've ever had one.
No, it tastes like a creamsicle like. It tastes like a creamsicle. It's not like a shot of whiskey and a punch in the eye. It's like literally, it tastes like magic. But it has its own interesting history because it was actually a really popular drink in the seventies because it was promoted by the McKesson Imports company to try to get attention on the liquor they were on the liqueur they were importing, which is Galliano, of which I am a fan Galliano. If you haven't had it before,
I've probably talked about it in recipes. Sometimes people will refer to it as a vanilla liquor I probably have. That's a little misleading because it also has notes of annis and some other like citrus tones. There's a little smoky note to it. It's its own interesting thing, and their original one. They came up with this. It had like a cartoon character that went with it, who was like a surfer named Harvey Wallbanger, not at all like the dudes in this story. Their original recipe for a
Harvey Wallbanger, and it's like a variation on a screwdriver. Okay, six ounces of orange juice, one ounce of vodka, stir with ice, splash in a half ounce of Galliano. So I thought, how can we take this drink that was very popular then and make it something different and a little interesting and maybe even a little silly and also very yummy, because that just sounded right. So for ours, here's what we're doing. We're keeping the vodka, but we're
bumping it up to an ounce and a half. And this is where I'm gonna make my case in case anyone out there has not had a potato vodka, because now it's the time. I love potato vodka. It's very smooth. By the way, vodka can be made out of almost anything. There are actually arguments in among countries about the laws. There was a big argument in the EU about what could and cannot be considered vodka some years back. But really, if you have like a sugar and something starchy, and
you can ferment those, you can make a vodka. But a potato vodka is really like smooth and delicious. They're not hard to find. There's several brands that are really good. Most liquor stores carry them. If you can't find it on the regular shelf, as the person that works at your liquor store, sometimes it's on like that little narrow shelf where they put like what they consider the higher end vodkas.
That's a good point, yeah, but it's.
Usually not that expensive. Try potato vodka if you haven't. It's amazing. So an ounce and a half of vodka, a half ounce of Galiano. Look, if you can't find Galliano, get a vanilla liqueur. It won't be quite the same, but you can do it. And then you're gonna add an ounce of pineapple juice. And I know they wanted their stirred, but I like to shake this because the liqueur and the juice, it just makes it all smooth out together. And then you're gonna shake that with ice,
strain it over fresh ice in a highball glass. And then we're not doing orange juice, but what we are gonna do is orange soda. This makes this the silliest, tastiest drink. I will confess a thing. I made this twice this morning. I did not drink two cocktails before we came in. I didn't have to make it twice the first time. Often I'll look for a low sugar soda. Yeah, I got one of the fancy pantsy unicorn orange sodas that has low sugar and prebiotics in it.
Wow.
It was fine, but it wasn't what I was after.
Do you want the soda from our childhood?
Then? Yeah, I had to go back and get the SODA's of our childhood. There are a few different very yummy orange sodas that, depending on where you lived, might have been your jam. And that that's perfect. This is one that literally tastes like it just is that moment in Ratituey. Yeah, when anton Ego remembers being a kid, it took me right back to like being a kid on my skates.
I know exactly what you're talking about.
Go into the pool. I was like, I'm gonna skate down to the pool and then I'm gonna swim, and then I'm gonna put my skates back on and go home. It was like that, and I like that it brought about that sense of innocence when we have been talking about nothing but corruption. It's like the antidote to this time.
I was just about to say that it's a nice.
Pairing to make this a mocktail is easyspie. We are gonna say sometimes we'll do a bump up and be like, just use more juice. Don't in this case because it's already really sweet. So you will still use your ounce of pineapple juice. When I mentioned top it off with orange soda, I put about four ounces on mine. You can up or down that depending on your taste, but
I did about four ounces. And instead of the vodka, I would just use like a sparkling water or a seltzer if you have it, And obviously you're not gonna shake that because your shaker will pop. Don't do that. And then instead of galiano, I would skip that completely, and I would add a couple drops of vanilla extract. I wouldn't do a vanilla syrup here because you already have a lot of sweet stuff going on and that's
just going to make it cloying. So that again the mocktail is an ounce and a half of sparkling water or seltzer, a couple drops of vanilla liquor, an ounce of pineapple juice, and then four ounces at your discretion of orange soda total. So still very yummy. It's still going to make you feel like you're in a younger time. It also like, let's be clear, these things were happening when I was at the age that I was putting on my roller skates and running around town and wanted
to go swimming and be innocent. It's all tied into my psyche in terms of we all need a break, and this is a drink that gives you a break. Every once in a while. You need a ridiculous drink that is sweet and is based on the soda as you grew up with when you were a kid. It's true, there's something so fun about it and you can't help but giggle. It's not like the kind of thing you're gonna savor with friends inand bar. It's exactly what you
need sometimes. Stick a straw in that thing and have your moment travel back in time to innocence, and then all that sugar will give you the energy to fight the corrupt people in our lives today.
Exactly. I think we all know I'm not the biggest, like sweet person. This is so childhood for me that I that doesn't even matter.
Yeah, it's just fun. It's just fun. And we are calling this one the Fraudster because it's almost it doesn't even feel like you're drinking a cocktail even though there's a vodka and Gollano.
In it, so just having some orange soda.
It feels fake. It references the many frauds of Hansen, so hopefully puts a smile on your face. We certainly get smiles on our faces knowing that you have spent this time with us, and we hope you will come back next week. We're going to talk a little bit more about blackmail, but we're nearing the end of the season and then we'll roll into something brand new. We will see you right back here next week on Criminalia. Criminalia is a production of Shondaland Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio.
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