Ridiculous Crime is a production of iHeartRadio.
Saren, Hey, Elizabeth, what's something my girl? Much?
Listen? You know it's ridiculous I do all right.
You like gambling, okay, the lottery?
Oh yeah.
So imagine if you took your love of gambling and you said like, hey, I'm going to start gambling like Iheart's money, right, okay, right, yeah exactly. I thought you'd like this, and then you like lost a bunch of it, like twenty million of it, and then you're like, oh, and did I say, You've been betting on FanDuel right, like a bunch of Ihearts money on Fandel because you love the sports. And then you're like, you know, betting,
and you lose twenty million cause you're not good at betting. No, And then Iheart's like, yo, man, we noticed you spent twenty million of our money and you're like, no, no, no, Fandel. I gave it to Fandel. So then iHeart goes to Fandel and goes, all right, give us back our money. Yeah. Fandal's like, no, it's a gambling site. What are you
talking about. This happened to the Jacksonville Jaguars one of their employees a Jacksonville Jaguar employee started gambling on like company time, their money, and basically a mid level finance manager managed to steal twenty two million dollars through a virtual credit card system that the Jaguars used for their expenses. So this is like you know, payroll and like expenses and like vendors and stuff. So he's taking their money and being like, ah, we need to pay out to
a FanDuel for one hundred thousand dollars. I haven't had a bad weekend, right, does this over and over again, and then you know, the Jaguars tried to sue FanDuel and get their money back. On the Jaguars, no, it's just it's their money. They're like, he doesn't have the right to spend our money.
Understand that.
They're like, well, that's the talk to the cops. You know, we're a gambling SciTE. If someone comes into a casino with all their money, yeah, that's on y'all. That's casino money now. So as as a source said, and they were talking about whether or not the Jacksonville Jaguars could likely get their money back, yeah, the source said, and I quote the way they see it, we got this money, fair and clear. It's not our problem that we have
to forfeit it back to you. So and they said I would be godsmacked if it happened, So I'm with them. I'll be surprised. But how amazing is that? The Jacksonville Jaguars are like, can we have please?
Well, yeah, it's like a lot. I can't sue, dude.
Because they got ridiculous.
That is so ridiculous. Do you want to know what else is ridiculous? Oh my god, please hair helmets?
What now?
This is ridiculous crime A podcast about absurd and outrageous CAPERSU cons. It's always ninety nine percent murder free and one hundred percent ridiculous.
I know you heard that same aman, Yeah.
Crook and politicians, yes, maddening, completely right, unless unless they're entertaining. Yes, So, like we had Buddy Cianci.
Up and that was a good one.
And then there's the Big Dog, a personal favorite of mine, Bumfardo.
Oh yes, that guy classics both of um.
Let's take a moment of silence for that character and his rose colored glasses. Not too long ago. I just didn't give him a big moment.
That was not much of a moment of silence. Do you know how moment of silence work. There's a moment of silence. Really, I take it out, you try it something?
Okay?
There?
Just like that.
So not too long ago, September twenty fourteen, we lost another crooked politician. No, this was a real character.
Who was he?
James, A trafficant junior. Oh yeah. Some people called him Jim, others called him Jimbo, and still others called him Crooked as a barrel of snakes.
It's a weird nickname.
Crooked as an old dog's hind leg.
That's an even weirder nickname.
So crooked that if he swallowed a nail, he'd spit up a corkscrew Slicker than a slop jar, Crooked to unscrew his bridges at night, more slippery than a pocket full of pudding. That's my favorite. Slickered and a boiled onion.
You know these are good. I'm just waiting for more traffic.
He was born in Youngstown, Ohio, in nineteen forty one. I'm just going to cut to the chase.
That's a problem town.
When it all started, Yeah, son of a truck.
Drive good mafia there when.
I stubbed my toe, I yell, son of a truck driver. He went to college, got himself a bachelor's in education from the University of Pittsburgh.
Congratulations, you know, good for him, pit.
Do you know who else was at the University of Pittsburgh at that same time, Damn Marina, Mike Ditka and Marty Schottenheimer. Oh interesting, Yeah, traffic can't new them really because he just happened to be the quarterback a team with them. Damn. So we got like an all American story brewing. Seriously, Like this hard working class guy comes up, he's a quarterback. He was. I I live in the dream Ka, but it wasn't a dream that he liked too much. During his senior season, he told a reporter quote,
pitt has the worst coaching staff in the country. I've made two big mistakes in my life. The first one was coming here. The second one was staying like ouch, just leave why.
Panthers.
After he graduated, he tried out for the Pittsburgh Steelers. Oh, and he didn't make the cut. And then he also tried out for the bad boys in the NFL, the Oakland Raiders. Oh, didn't make it there totally their loss. So he headed over to Youngstown State University and he got himself not one, but two master's degrees, one in administration and another in counseling. And those are good and the good degrees for someone who wants to go into government,
like make a difference. So he got a gig as executive director at the local county Drug program, and then he dipped his toe into the sometimes muddy waters of local politics. He started as the chair of the campaign for the Mahoning County Recorder, okay, and then he worked on the nineteen seventy eight campaign for the Youngstown mayoral Democratic candidate. Both of those won. Who was it zing, I don't know, So this was Youngstown, Ohio, because it doesn't matter what their names were.
I don't know about the mafia and your well we're getting there. Oh really nice.
Yeah, Youngstown, Ohio a steel town that had seen better days.
Yes, that's a good way.
Factories were closing, companies were, you know, moving their operations overseas, and you know, good working class folks are starting to suffer. And as you were saying, it's not just a factory town, it was mob territory, like big time Biggins. An IRS report once said quote certain factions of the Cleveland and Pittsburgh organized crime families of Lakosa Nostra. Oh they right there, campaigned for control of certain illegal activities conducted in the
Mahoning Valley during nighttime. Teen seventy nine and nineteen eighty. The competing factions wage day quote war primarily during the first half of nineteen seventy nine, in which a number of individuals associated with both factions were killed. However, the factions operating in the Mahoning Valley were also known to negotiate and to cooperate with each other. Here's a struggling, hard working area sitting in the center of a mob war. Yes,
Trafficant's time to shine. So nineteen seventy nine, Trafficant runs for sheriff of Mahoning County. And I'm hoping I'm saying the name of the county right, but you know, odds are now he runs for sheriff as a Democrat. The post of sheriff basically under the thumb of the mob at the time, and so they installed their guide generally in order for things to you know, move smoothly for them. And inside guy, as we say, sure, Trafficant ran on an anti corruption campaign, and so he's like, nope, I
am not owned by the mob. I am going to bust their butts.
Yes, of course, and actually I hate that what they're doing. It's bad, bad, bad.
And he won Sarin. He won, He beat the Democratic incumbent in the primary, and then he went on to win the general election November nineteen eighty. So, in early nineteen eighty one, an FBI investigation into some mob hits uncovered cassette tapes hidden in a bread box bigger than a bread box, No, hidden in a hidden in a bread box. The tapes were made during Trafficant's campaign, and they featured him just yapping, chatting it up with local mobsters, the Karabia brothers.
Wait a minute, he's supposed to be anti corruption, so he was. He was telling them, I'm going to anti corrupt.
Guess what, guys, I'm anti yu exactly, brothers. What are they talking about? In truth? Exchanges of money between themselves and traffic Can't, but also the money that Trafficant was taking from the rival Pittsburgh faction. You'll find both shots. So the mobsters they made the tapes because they were worried that traff Can was loyal to them.
Oh, of course.
On the tapes, traffic Cant and the Carabia brothers, they talked about the amount of money that each faction had given, like, well, how much should they give you, because like, we gave.
You this on what dates? Do you remember?
He tells them, Look like, this is how I washed in quotes, ten thousand dollars in cash through a local law firm to cover money that the mob figures had put into my sheriff's campaign. He's like, let me lay it out here, don't worry about it. And then he jokes, He's like, hey, once I'm sheriff, Like I might just take down the Pittsburgh faction for obstruction of political justice. He's like, I'll do you a favor.
I've made a lun sheet, a careful lunch sheet. Here is that all done well?
And one of the Carabbias tells him like, if you do that, if you take down the Pittsburgh guys, you'll you will be a hero. In fact, you could run for Congress and win if you did.
It's like, let me update my flow charte.
So remember, the FBI has those tapes, and it wasn't just like novelty listening for them, they weren't using them like they're outgoing answering machine message. As a goof June of nineteen eighty one, they haul Trafficant into their Youngstown office. Get in here, come here. He's all dressed as sheriff, and in my mind that's like a party city coffee car. So they wanted to know, like, tell us about this whole taking money from the mob thing, just tell us
about it. He's like, I don't know what you're talking about. And then they click hit play, so Trafficant's like, yep, that's my voice, that's me talking. FBI is like, great, here, sign this paper that says that's you on the tape, and traffic Ant does. He's like, that is me on the tape. But the whole time he's signing it, he's like it's not true though, like none of it's true,
like he's entering into Pelicano territory. So the FBI was like, all right, how about this, like we will fix any inaccuracies to this statement, and he's like, well, I don't have there aren't any on the paper, and yet it's supposed to all be lies. Like I don't get it. So traffican't. He tells the fbis that he already used up most of the MOB money, so he couldn't return it, can't get it back like FanDuel that. So the FBI like, they're probably completely flummixed by this guy. They ask him
where a wire? Please, I'm begging of you, you know, help us take down the mob and like the FBI though they weren't promising immunity in exchange for his cooperation, but he still agrees to.
It for free.
Yeah, but he never wore the wire, Like have you worn it? He's like, yeah, I just got really busy and like a chance, so I'll get I'll take care of it. He said he only wanted to cooperate if quote it was not made public that his cooperation was a result of the FBI's discovery of the bread box tape, if he himself had some control over direction of the investigation so that he could protect certain individuals, if he
remained as sheriff. He's like, I just want to do a little bit of illegal stuff and just let me just get a smidge in there.
Come on.
FBI is totally over it. They charge him with accepting one hundred and sixty three thousand dollars in bribes quote from reputed organized crime figures during his election campaign. Then they hit him with the Rico Act violations failing to report the bribes on a federal income tax return.
Oh, they just rico him on his own. Oh, they don't bring him in like anything else.
You are your own conspiracy. In eighty two, he gets indicted by a grand jury. Okay, and then he goes on the offensive, like you know, he became the quarterback. He took a charge yea, And by that, I mean he really starts working the press. Oh. So the trial had not even started yet, and he turned around and
he charged twenty FBI agents with dereliction of duty. He said that the FBI knew in advance that three mobsters were going to be robbing this Youngstown greenhouse owner guy named pop Oh, and that they didn't do anything, like you knew.
He was going to have to let crime happen.
The guy he gets robbed at home, tied up, shot at with a taser or damn, and I mean he lives. And then the judge is like, you cannot arrest the FBI agents for not stepping in. No, I will not allow it.
All right, but do you know how the f GI works. They need a crime to prosecute.
As long as the press. So Trafficant then he makes news because there were thirteen houses under foreclosure in Youngstown and he's supposed to sign the notices and send the deputies out.
Oh, because he's right.
He refuses. He's like, I am not. Times are tough, no more suffering. Yeah, I deny these So by denying the orders, by the fact that he won't go through with the foreclosures, he gets arrested and charged with contempt and sentenced to one hundred days in jail. Now he lasts three days. He lasts three days, and then he agrees to sign the paper and then he's released. But like, even though he signs the eviction papers, this like self sacrifice turns him into a hero in that time. Oh
completely yeah. So as the trial is about to start, Trafficant fires his lawyer. His lawyer told the press that since the judge wouldn't let Trafficant cross examine witnesses when he was just the defendant, Like, Trafficant's got to be his own lawyer. You can't as the defendant, you can't get up and cross examine.
He wants to be the one asking.
Only the lawyer can do that. So he's like, well, guess what, I'm lawyer.
Guess there's a lawyer now, and the lawyer's talk.
The lawyer wanted to stay on, and then the FEDS were like, yeah, you need to be the legal advisor. But Trafficant said that he fired his lawyer because quote, nobody could know when another person did. Nobody can grasp the complexity of the case, which is like basically what Anthony Pelicano said. Sure, so Trafficant ends up defending himself in court.
Always a good move.
The trial began in Cleveland in May of nineteen eighty three. He was able to convince the judge that part of the jury pool should come from Youngstown to his hometown, and about half the jury winds up being his constituents. Okay, so here's his argument. He said, yes, I took the money evidence. I'm building a case against the mob. I'm planning a sting. The FBI won't do it, I'll do it, he said. Quote the FBI made a statement that in fifty years they were not able to penetrate this corrupt
mafia controlled town. You want to hear something. Do you know how long it took me? I filed nominating petitions for sheriff, and I met every mafia figure in the valley. Look, if you want to stamp out organized crime and they offer you money, what are you gonna say? I don't want anything to do with it. That's his quote.
He's got a fair point. And if in the how he's buddying the waters as the part that I really like is the whole like, oh, they couldn't do it. I did it, And then the people are like, oh, look at that, our anti corruption guy. Back at it.
Right? He said he never promised or like, gave the mob anything in return for this money. And in court he said that the FBI agents like they forged his signature on that paper and then it was also full of lies.
Did they hit play again? He's like, okay, I'll sign this.
He busts the Pelicano. He says the tapes. Of course, the jury loved him.
It's Ai. It's Ai before Ai.
Four days of deliberation, jury returns and not guilty.
Of course he only needed one of them, so and he got fifty percent of them.
Yeah, exactly, So the FBI lawyer said quote. It was a frustrating trial. I bet there is no case harder to prosecute than one in which an intelligent, articulate, and aggressive defendant decides to represent himself. In our view, the evidence of guilt was overwhelming, but Traffican't, a skilled politician, was able to effectively divert the jury's attention from the essential issues of basic guilt and innocence.
Taking notes though, wait a minute, so aggressive smart to be your own lawyer makes it difficult for the facts.
Okay, to the day after he's yeah, he gets acquitted. Next day he tells the press that he's going to go after the mob. Sure, and that never real.
Of course, anti corruption guy, Right, we all.
Know, let's take a break. When we come back, we'll keep track this man as he weasels his way into the halls of power. Welcome he Jazon listens, Aaron.
When we left off, we were talking about our thing.
Yeah, Jimbo, we're talking about our thing, this thing of ours, Jimbo Traffican'. He was sheriff and he'd beaten federal rico charges.
This is impressively rarely do you beat the thing.
Yeah. So nineteen eighty four, Fresh off the courtroom victory. He ran for a Democratic seat in Congress.
Okay, he won.
He won. The mob was right, Zara, They were totally right, like.
You're a congressional material exactly.
But it wasn't the end of the legal woes attached to those original bribes, because like traffic can't. He got with not reporting the mob money that he took his income, and which I always love when they're like, all right, so you broke the law, but still you got to report the illegal income. In eighty six, the IRS started garnishing his wages.
For not paying taxes on criminal funds.
Yeah, he was forced to pay taxes on one hundred and eight thousand dollars that he took from the mob, which you know, okay, fair enough. Since he was in Congress at the time and like to get ahead of the messaging, he used his allotted one minute on the House floor to respond. He said, quote, I'm sick and tired and I've had enough. I'm saying on the floor of Congress today, if they scare my daughter and my family again, I'm going to go over to the IRS
office myself and punch their lights out. I embarrassed the IRS and they targeted me. I led the ninety ninth Congress in opposing President Reagan and his policies, and he, just like President Nixon, sent the irs after me.
Oh, Reagan, like Nixon. I like that he's gonna go to the irs and punts their lights out. Like he's just walking down the hallway ute. He's going down just like one thing.
It's like I like ten forty standing on the sidewalk outside, I like going.
Like full of grand theft auto inside hire has just knock his reckons all these people on the ground.
That's how he saw it in his head. I think Congress though not enough for him. No, nineteen eighty seven, he announced that he was running for president.
What I thought's gonna be like governor traffic, No, senator traffic.
Obviously obviously it didn't go anywhere. Okay, Yeah, but he was easily re elected to Congress for nine terms in total.
Yes, they say that the religion is the last the refuge of the scoundrel. I'm fairly starting as Congress is he gets the house right there, Yeah, the House is like okay, well, yeah, you don't like religion, come over here totally.
In nineteen eighty six, he ran unopposed and he received the largest vote of any House member in the country, with more than two hundred and eighteen thousand votes. In two thousand, he was reelected, did fifty percent of the vote in a three way race. Wow, it's amazing. So his favorite issues were illegal immigration, so it's like a like illegal free trade and foreign steel imports. He's like
playing the greatest hits here. He was all about fighting to get language into legislation that made it so that products that the federal government would buy should have like a maide in the USA label on it.
Oh dude, this would play huge in the oh Man. He knows his arnt money.
He got federal grants for hometown projects like highways, a sports arena, and then yeah, money for the Youngstown Airport. His other big calling card was those one minute speeches on the House floor. He made hundreds of them, and the best part is that he would end them by saying beam me up, like beat me up on it. And he delivered them like basically almost every day that the House was in session. Let me read you a
couple of quote, mister speaker. A new report says only seven percent of scientists believe in God that is right. And the reason they gave was that the scientists are quote super smart, unbelievable. Most of these absent minded professors cannot find the toilet. I have one question for these wise guys to constipate over, how can something come from nothing? And while they digest that, mister speaker, let us tell
it like it is. Put these super cerebral master debaters in some foxhole with bombs bursting all around them, and I guarantee they will not be praying to Frankenstein beam me up.
Oh wow, no atheist and a foxhole. I love it saying be me up, me am. I sorry using that when I walk into places totally.
Sometimes you put it at the beginning, but the best ones are at the end. Quote mister speaker, The Lord's Prayer is sixty six words. The Gettysburg addresses two hundred and eighty six words. The Declaration of Independence is one three hundred and twenty two words. US regulations on the sale of cabbage, that is right, cabbage is twenty seven
thousand words. Regulatory red tape in America cost taxpayers four hundred billion dollars every year, over four thousand each year every year year in year out for every family, beam me up.
One is just a speech, the other one's regulation. They should be the same thing.
How I love that he felt the like the need to get up and complain about people being atheists. What does that have to do with anything? And then he then he goes on to talk about wasting taxpayer money after just spending. Okay, so his website was amazing. It had a picture of him holding a two by four with the phrase underneath banging away in DC.
Yeah, so he's like Hacksaw Jim Duggan, the WWE wrestler. Oh, he's just beam.
Up well and like much like Bumfardo. He was known for his unique look. Oh yeah, he bell bottoms and Dunham suits in the eighties, in the nineties, in the.
Nineties, it's a boss moved.
He also had like a viciously bad haircut to pay combo.
He became he became so bad in fashion, became pre fashion. Yes, he came back around.
Yeah exactly, so his hair.
Can you describe it?
Well? Let me let me let me tell you how the Washington Post tried to Okay, quote reporters outdid themselves in trying to describe mister Traffickant's pompadour and to determine whether it was real. In the words of the Los Angeles Times, it was a quote planet of the apes sort of hair helmet, or as Washingtonian Magazine put it, quote a creature from Lake Erie before it was cleaned up.
So his policy stances, he leaned more Republicans Democrats, so much so that he was invited to attend and like maybe address they put it out there, you might want to talk at the two thousand Republican National Convention.
M by bartisanship and all that well.
And in two thousand he also voted to re elect Republican Dennis Hastard as speaker. Oh wow, Dennis Hastard, the disgusting pig. He would later be charged and convicted of sexual abuse and hush money payments. That does as so traffick Hand's vote for Hastart was too far for the Dems. Yes, they kicked him out of the caucus, took away committee assignments. Yeah, he's persona on Grada. And like most high profile politicians today, he had a Ukraine issue. Oh yeah, interesting see there
was this guy named John Demjanjuk. He was a Ukrainian immigrant living in Cleveland, and he was accused of being the Nazi war criminal that people called Ivan the Terribleez. Yeah. So he was supposed to be a really really brutal prison guard at the Treblinka concentration camp. Oh god, and the US Justice Department took away his citizenship in nineteen eighty one, and he got deported to Israel for trial there. He gets convicted in Israel in nineteen eighty eight, sentenced
to death. But through it all he and his family were swearing the whole thing was a case of mistaken identity, and his family begged for help, but their own congress members they wouldn't touch it. They're like, I want nothing to do with this. So Trafficant's like, I'll do it, nay. Yeah, And he just like milked the press for his, you know, supposedly brave stance to like stand up and help this
guy in a case of standing corruption. Yeah. So, using Freedom of Information Act requests, Trafficant was able to get documents, including an alleged photo of the actual Ivan, and then testimony from other Nazis at Treblinka who didn't recognize the guy that proved he was not Ivan the Terrible in nineteen ninety three, the Israeli Supreme Court overturned the conviction and trafficant brought the dude back to the United States. So like, he may not have been Ivan the Terrible,
but he was still terrible. Oh really Yeah, there was a lot of evidence that he had been in SS prison guard at a different Polish concentration camp. He later he like, so he gets extradited to Germany.
Extradited, yes, So they're like, he's not terrible, He's a different, different.
Terrible guy. And Germany's just like, hand him over, we'll take him. And so they charge him and they convict him with more than twenty eight thousand counts of accessory to murder. He gets sentenced to prison. So he dies in a nursing home in Germany at the age of ninety one, awaiting his appeal, which is like too kind even though like traffic can't defends him until the end it is like, well, I don't think that's true. I don't think any of this is true.
I don't know.
So you can't spell traffic, can't without the word bribery if you don't know how to spell. And in May two thousand and one, traffic can't he gets indicted by a grand jury on four counts of bribery, two counts of tax evasion, two counts of racketeering, and one count each of obstructing justice and accepting illegal gifts.
That's an Ohio full house.
He faced up is sixty three years in prison and a two million dollar fine if convicted. Like, how can that be your ass?
How can that be Elizabeth?
Exactly? Thank you for asking well. Prosecutors said that Trafficant started taking bribes right after he got into office in nineteen eighty five. Like just immediately puts the box on the desk, puts his hand out, starts taking it. But they were more interested in recent stuff. This is what the Washington Post had to say. It was alleged that quote local contractors did work on Trafficant's boat and family farm and gave him money in exchange for political favors.
The indictment also alleges that he accepted monthly twenty five hundred dollars payments from a staff member in exchange for hiring the aid and renting office base from him at total more than one hundred thousand dollars, and that Trafficant ordered aids to perform manual labor on the boat and farm during regular work hours.
He's got a congressional aids gone out their buffons.
Ye, they show up in their like you know, dockers, and he's like no, no, no, go ch change because you're going out to the boat.
Do you know about.
Well? How did what did they do down on the farm? Right?
What did they do down on the farm, Elizabeth?
A really good thing? I sightful question.
It's a profound question.
They bailed hay on the farm. Really, they maintained horse stalls and they did a little light construction work.
It's like a prison farm pretty much.
And then what about the boat?
What about the boat, Elizabeth?
It wasn't just any boat. It was a houseboat that he lived on when he was in DC. He lived on a houseboat, which is just shady in general, of course. But also he apparently bought the thing from old toe tapper Larry Craig. Oh lord, ye, this is.
Part of my rule. The only person I've ever trusted as a houseboat is Travis Spaghee and he's fictional. Yes, So.
Traffagan had his minions scraping barnacles off the houseboat, which was a total wreck apparently. No, it's not an euphemism. And like for all the free labor, the place was.
Just disrepair, I imagine.
But it was a community builder, a male bonding experience. That's how he described it. It's not hard labor. This is a mail bonding.
This is a place to spill whiskey.
April two thousand and one, an Ohio businessman named John Kafaro. He admitted that he quote arranged nearly twenty seven thousand dollars in repairs on mister Trafficant's houseboat in Washington and then bought the boat for twenty six thousand dollars. Prosecutors, I love that boat. Well, mister Trafficant was lobbying federal agencies on behalf of a laser guidance system sold by mister Kafaro's company, the US Aerospace Group.
It's a coincidence.
I'll sink twenty seven grand into the boat, and I'll buy it from you for twenty six.
We were talking about business. He took me to his boat and I said I'd like to buy this too, and we.
Really turned around and let me donate it back you. So this is also from the Washington Post. Quote Trafficant is also accused of accepting more than ten thousand dollars worth of paving at the family farm in return for pressuring federal and state highway officials on behalf of a contractor who'd been convicted of felonies from another contractor. Traffic Can't allegedly accepted labor and materials in return for intervening
with a local government agency about a building demolition contract. Heyway, everyone, everyone has talents and skills. What are yours and what are they worthing?
Have you been to my house? Point out what you can fix.
So the government's evidence included, you know, among a bunch of other things, quote, a briefcase full of cash, letters for.
You get one of those, a briefcase.
Can you put that on the order list from iHeart letters from trafficant to government officials, and then a delicatess in place that upon which he wrote a list of tasks that he wanted a contractor to perform. And he's probably like paving plus framing this building equals you'll get the contract.
He's the kind of guy who would like get a video camera record his meeting for the thing and then give it to him. Here's what we said, here's these you just go back and look at the case.
Let's just circle back around. It's like when you have a meeting and then you send the email afterwards because you're like, these people aren't going to do it. We just talked about like, okay, so here are action points for this. Traffic can't denies everything.
None of that's not old paper. Trail traffic can't.
So the trial starts February two thousand and two at the Federal Courthouse in Cleveland, Great Court House. Once again. Traffic Cant's going to represent himself. Strategy last time to know, he said that he chose to be his own lawyer because, like you know, he'd been a government target since nineteen eighty three, and he knew there's absolutely no attorney who can win this case.
Keeps costs down.
He's thinking about the voter cost. He said. Well here, he said that, like, I don't have the money to spend on a lawyer for this huge trial course. So this one goes a little bit differently than the nineteen.
No, you don't get that lucky twice.
This time they wouldn't let him bring in jurors from Youngstown, all from Cleveland, and then he also wanted to know the religious and ethnic backgrounds of all potential jurors.
That's fair, right, well, he said.
Quote As a defender of John Demjanik, a controversial Ukrainian immigrant acquitted of being a World War two holocross torturer known as Ivan the Terrible, mister Traffickan has complained that some jurors with Jewish sympathies could prove biased. Well, first of all, the parsing of that language that like the guy gets acquitted of being Ivan the Terrible, Yes, but not his real terrible. So the request is denied. No, you cannot interrogate these people as to their religious beliefs.
The judge was not having it with all his antics. The judge warns him, this trial is not going to be a Donnybrook. You will behave yourself in this courthouse and you will behave yourself outside because like Traffickant told the press, like while proclaiming his innocence, that he predicted and promised a Donnybrook and the whole inside outside the
courthouse thing. According to the AP quote, during the two month trial, he did a curbside interview on live network television outside the courthouse each morning, and then went inside to challenge the U. S. District Judge Leslie Brooks Wells, who tried to dissuade traffic Camp from representing himself, wearing.
A shirt that said, who's here for the Donnybrook? I love this guys. I mean I'm not like a fan of him, but his spirit so mad. It's big.
Yeah, exactly, big spirit. Let's take a break. Okay, we come back. We'll get a glimpse of the trial, if you know what I mean. Hello, Hello, Saren, get back here, Elizabeth. James trafficking.
Yes, oh right, go on.
So he's on trial once again. He's representing himself once again. Smart it was a zoo and that's the way he liked it. Of course, yeah, he's a zoo paper So Zaren close your eyes. Yes, I want you to picture it. You are dur number five in the trial of James Traffic Cant. You can't believe your good fortune. This is a total show and you are loving it. Best entertainment ever.
It's been a good month so far. You've made a ton of money on your Super Bowl bet for the Patriots to take the Saint Louis Rams by three points. Salt Lake City Winter Olympics have kicked off, and you know you're hoping that Alicia Keys wins a bunch of Grammys, which she will. But for now, you're in the courtroom and you're excited for another day at the circus. I'm here this morning much like other mornings. James traffic caan't arrives at the courtroom in style. His style. Today he's
wearing a three piece denim suit. The pants are bell bottoms, and over this he's wearing a canvas jacket with leather trim on the cuffs and pockets. Sharp. It's two thousand and two PS. So the trial gets underway for the day, the usual droning from the prosecution and the usual interruptions and objections from Trafficant. Trafficant's trying to cross examine a witness and keeps asking the most random questions, and each
time he gets murmurs or chuckles from the gallery. He's asking a guy on the stand about how many times they may have dined together, in the context that his former friend had many opportunities to wear a wire and tape their interactions. You drank zinfandel, Trafficant says, yes, and you drank merlow Man replies, I ask the questions. Trafficant sharply retorts, then turns towards the jury and gives you a smirk and a raised eyebrow. What the He continues
with some weird side quest question about restaurants. This time the prosecution stands objection relevance sustained. You're all traffic camt pipes up. I object to that objection. I'm up against a lawyer here with the testicles of an ant. Folks in the gallery laugh. I don't know what that means, mister trafficamp, but knock it off enough. One worry of your outbursts and I'll find you in contempt. I mean, it's fun, but it's going to be a long day and this is going to wear thin on you soon.
So scene, let me tell you who testified, please, an Ohio personal injury attorney Alan Sinclair. He said that he paid traffic Cant twenty five hundred dollars each month in exchange for being on his staff.
A personal injury lawyer. Yeah, paid a twenty five hundred dollars bill or bribe brother every month to stay on the staff.
He paid for a job, Yeah, and he made sixty K a year as a joh, he kickbacked half his job, half his salary whatever.
Yeah, as a personal injury lawyer who wants to be on this staff.
Well, he was still working full time.
Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Would be kind of busy.
While he was quote working yeah.
Yeah.
So, according to The New York Times, Sinclair testified that once traffic caan't found out, Sinclair would be testifying against him. Quote. The congressman sent notes to him asserting that there had been loans, not kickbacks, he said. Mister trafficant eventually handed back twenty four five hundred dollars in cash to him. To him, he's like, oh, I.
Thought that they were basically nobody was doing the work and they were just splitting this salary they were. So that's so that's what it was.
It was like a no show job basically.
Okay.
Yeah, But then he's like, ho ho ho ho, those weren't No, we weren't splitting the job. I was loaning new money.
Here's the other part. Yeah, he's trying to get out of it by saying, like, if I give you back, exactly, queen, exactly, there's no crime now, right, Officer He said.
That traffic Caant tried to coach him for his conversations with the FBI and the grand jury, and then like on a bunch of different times that they had gotten together and burned evidence, like the envelopes that held the cash. They're like, let's have an evidence burning.
How did you coach someone for that?
It's fun mail bondings.
This was like in the Iron John era of the seventies.
Yeah, they got to bang drums and yell forests and burn evidence, burn evidence place mats. In one of their like encounter sessions, Sinclair had doubts about burning the envelope. He's like, I don't know if this is a good idea. Trafficant gets up and leaves, and then Sinclair puts the fire out and then takes the envelope, Oh that's like maybe just a charred inside, and hands it over to the FBI as evidence. So remember that Trafficant one hundred
and seventy acre farm outside of Youngstown. I do of those where men bailed Hey, where men were men and they bailed hay and they learned about masculinity. So around nineteen ninety four, Trafficant paid a local contractor named Henry Nemmits twenty five thousand dollars to build a pole barn and a riding area. Okay, Nemts also owned a small
grocery chain. So Nemits said that traffic Can't asked for what amounted to like triple the work that he agreed to do, and instead of paying the bills, traffic Can't offered a quote inner seed in a labor dispute Nemman's hat at the time with the local Food and Commercial Workers Union. Oh so he's like, here's what I'm going to pay you. He builds it. He's like, I'm actually not going to pay you that. I'm going to make your union troubles go away.
So it wasn't even the arrangement going in. It was the arrangement when the bills going out. Yeah. Wow.
So, according to the Youngstown Vindicator, which is an amazing name for a newspaper, to quote, Traffic Cant, who would occasionally fill in as host on various radio stations, did a remote broadcast from one of Nemets's stores and urged his constituents to cross the picket line and shop at the store. That's one way to lose the union boats.
Yeah, yeah.
So the trial lasted eight weeks, and after a ninety minute closing argument, traffic Can't apologized to the judge and the jury, saying, quote, I've been a real pain in the ascot. If you were in the room when I threw boxes, I apologize a pain in the ascot. Oh. Closing argument also apparently included the use of a roll of toilet paper.
Oh yes, he had props well, quote.
To demonstrate the government's case didn't hold water.
That was it.
That was it. I thought.
I thought he said stuff like written on and he'd rolled it up, and it's just.
Something even more.
Oh wow.
April eleventh, after four days of deliberations, Trafficant was convicted by a jury of all ten counts against him. So that's like conspiracy, bribery, travel and interstate commerce to carry on the unlawful act of bribery because he's going back and forth between DC.
So he got busted on the full everything.
You know exactly. He got sentenced to only eight years in prison, though, and he had to pay eighteen hundred, like on thousand and eight forty a month for his own imprisonment. Oh wow, that's cold blooded. It's kind of a great punishment to pay for it, and then he also had to pay like another ninety six thousand in restitution. So he said he was still planning on running for Congress again.
Of course he was.
His time is an independence, and he didn't just plan, he filed to run. I'm ready, he said, quote, I may be the first person in America to win a seat while incarcerated.
Would he be? I think?
Well he wasn't. Oh yeah, he didn't. Even he got fifteen percent of the vote though.
Fifteen yeah.
Do you remember the two pey Oh yes, that came off for the booking photo. No. Yeah, and he couldn't wear it inside.
Oh yeah, that's right.
And I like to think that he crafted his own out of like loose threads and pieces of shredded wheat and sticks and fruit leather. Instead he grew a thin, scraggly ponytail. Oh yeah, he just made it worse. Just shave your head. After his conviction, the House asked him to step down. Absolutely yeah, and he refused.
Come in and get me.
July two thousand and two, his fellow reps they voted on whether to expel him from the house. At the hearing, here's what he said quote, I understand the political dynamics. I am prepared to be expelled. I'm prepared to go to jail because I didn't do this. But I'm telling you you have allowed Rico to degenerate to the point where mothers are going to be convicted of colluding to buy Kellogg's breakfast cereal. Beat me up, Me me up, everybody.
He also said, quote, Am I different? Yeah? Do I change my pants?
No?
Deep down you know you want to wear wid er bottoms. You're just not secure enough to do it. Do I do my hair with a weed whacker? I admit I've helped everybody in my district. Yeah, I didn't even like some of them. But when they had a twenty two percent unemployment rate, did I go to bat for them? Yes? I'm prepared to lose everything. I'm prepared to go to jail. You go ahead and expel me, but I'm going to
tell you what. You didn't elect me. My people don't want me out, and I don't think you should take their representative away. And with that, thank you for listening to me and vote your conscience. Nothing personal. But he didn't give a be meal.
Yeah, I like though the whole traffic. Can't traffic, can't you different? Your bottom's too wide.
You're just not brave enough, too hard, You're just not brave enough for pill bottom.
Basically, the fashion police on him is just oh god, I would love to say some of those opening lines. I won't even lie totally.
He was expelled now by a vote of four twenty to one, which is just a chef's kiss for.
Quote, the only vote to keep himself Congress.
He was expelled for quote illegal gratuity, conspiracy, obstruction of justice, defrauding the government, racketeering, and tax evation violations. And then he turned around later and he called his colleagues political prostitutes, and he said, quote, I want to apologize to all the hookers of America for associating them with the United States.
Congress, giving them a bad name.
So travagant. He wanted to do his time in this Native ohen He's like a.
Less creative George Santas.
This is interesting basically, whereas like he goes wide in the legs, Santos goes tight, yes, exactly, squeeze on in there. Traffic, can't. He wanted to do time in Ohio. He didn't want to go anywhere else, mainly because he still wanted to be able to campaign there and so instead, though, he gets sent to a low security prison in Pennsylvania, and then he's later transferred to the Federal Medical Center in Minnesota, Minnesota.
That was my guess.
Yeah, he didn't have a lot of contact with his family or his friends when he was in prison, but that was by choice. Yeah, he told Fox News that quote, I did not want any visitors. I did not want my family to go see me in prison. If I died, they'd remember me the way I was. If I got out, I'd be.
Back actually kind of profound.
So he would like he would briefly in these very short calls. He'd call his wife two or three times a week, like.
One minute, Like he just take his one minute and give it to her.
Well yeah, well no, he took he kept them short because they're expensive.
Oh my god, that's why. Of course it is expensive. But yeah, he's got the corruption, the corruption.
For He also took up painting while in prison.
Oh and then after he was fine art painting, not just like painting other guys.
So yeah, he got when he got out. He would sometimes like say that his time in prison he would call it art school, and like his first his first twelve.
You call it being overseas at art school.
His first twelve paintings, which were sold through a website that a supporter set up, beammeupart dot com. Oh my god, that they sold out. This is what the website said. Quote. He has produced original paintings, mostly from memory, showing his beloved saddlebred horses on canvas, paper, prison, cardboard, and for mica. The paints and materials used were those that were available to him on a limited budget, often in short supply and difficult to obtain.
Some of them are toothpas.
See one. That's what it looks like.
Oh, that's like ten or eleven year old, like learned art. Like they got a little bit, they got some swoop.
It's got so bad.
No, it's not bad, I'm saying.
But it's just very weirdly French and also very like it's the.
You can see the kid is talented. It feels like a talented kid is learning to do shape and stuff exact and motion in the field of But whatever, it's not bad. I'm not criticizing.
It looks like a lot of prison arts.
And it doesn't look like an adult.
Noo, that's better than I could do.
Totally. I'm not suggesting that I could do what he did.
I'm just I think you could. In two thousand and six, the local Ohio art gallery they held a show of his works, and then the Prison Medical Center revoked his art privileges, saying that he was using him to make money.
Oh yeah, because he can't make money of his crime. Crime. Yeah.
He was released from prison September two thousand and nine. He did seven years, twelve hundreds.
That's a lot of art school.
Yeah, that is so, that's like they're bachelor's masters. Twelve hundred supporters attended his release party, twelve hundred and in there an Elvis impersonator.
Of course I expected that, And.
Then they had a traffic can't look alike contest? Oh my god, this is this is what he said to the Cleveland Plane Dealer. Yea paper, I was a quarterback, I was a congressman. Now I'm a convict. And then like he put his two payback on for this quote. I wouldn't change one single thing. And to the powerful enemies that I have, I'll just say this to you. You had to cheat to convict me. Yeah. So about a week after he gets out, he gives his first interview to Fox News on the Record, and he said
he was considering running again for congreourse. And then right after that he was a featured speaker at a tea party rally in Ohio. So he's like pendulum swing. So he's planning his campaign. He ran as an independent and he lost. He got sixteen percent of the vote. In twenty ten, he signed a three month contract to host a three hour Saturday afternoon talk show on a Cleveland AM radio station WTAM. And at this point, he's like living full time on the farm totally.
He drove he's got a three hour am radio show. I figured that's pretty much I live on a farm. If I heard he.
Would like, he'd just like tootle around the farm on his nineteen forty three Ford tractor. Yes, spreading manure, you know, man stuff.
Give me one of those red beauties.
He's like, I'm just doing man stuff out here. On the evening of September twenty September twenty third, twenty.
Fourteen, Course twenty fourteen, the tractor.
Rolled over as he was trying to take it back to that pole barn that he had the guy built for him.
Oh that's super dangerous.
Huh. He fell under. He was pinned for eight minutes before someone saw what happened and called for help. Oh wow, he was very badly injured. They took him to the nearest hospital and then they airlifted him to a bigger hospital and he passed away from his injuries, you know, four days later September twenty seventh, twenty fourteen. Yeah, very sad. A forensic pathologist said that his death was from positional and compressional asphyxiation from the tractor being on him.
So ad way to spell tractor.
But others say there was foul play hand.
The mob put a tractor on him.
Yeah, they said that he was a very careful driver who never would have rolled a tractor.
Come on, I come from farm people. That ain't true.
Folks like him just to like attract conspiracy mindy.
Of course, but there's no way to safe way to drive a tractor now.
He was buried in private service. Thousands of people went to his public memorial in October of twenty three. His old farmhouse was demolished as part of the Mill Creek Metro Parks plan to build a bicycle trail.
Oh, his house is now a bicycle trail, and like his.
Daughter, his daughter owned it at that point it was see it was seized under eminent domain.
Oh wow, that's hilarious.
So Zaren, what's your ridiculous takeaway?
I should get into politics, clearly. I mean, it's just like a giant magnet drawing this iron filing to it.
Uh huh No.
But in all honesty, as I said, I know about the Youngstown mafia before, but I didn't realize how corrupt Cleveland was coming out of the week. Look, we got no more money for steel, you know. I mean, it's an obvious thing, but I just hadn't thought about it and walked it all the way through. So now I'm gonna be very curious to go read about what happened in Cleveland in the late seventies. What's yours, Elizabeth? I did that all like. I just Hey, I want to
know what you have. Yeah, I want to know what you find.
I think you should start wearing bell bottoms and denim suits.
Wide bottoms.
Yeah, there you go, call them.
Hey, I'm wearing my wide body.
Hey, Captain D give me a talk back.
Oh my god, I went.
Hi, Elizabeth, So, a few episodes ago you mentioned that you wish someone would say, wow, look at the ovaries on this girl. And I just found out that there's a very common saying in Spanish that goes in bar de ovarios, which translated is she's got a pair of ovaries.
So I thought you might like that, thought I might like it. I love it, I love it, I love it. That's it for today. You can find us on the computer.
My computer d find us there.
Do you want to know where?
Yeah?
I guess Ridiculouscrime dot com at Ridiculous Crime on the various social well just Twitter and Instagram. You can email us at an email address. You can leave a talk back, just like that awesome one. iHeart app. Go ahead and reach out.
I had two languages.
It did.
It's good counting. Ridiculous Crime is hosted by Elizabeth Dutton and Zaren Burnette, produced and edited by convicted Senator Dave Kusten. Research is by FBI tape rewinder Marisa Brown and congressional staffer with a negative forty thousand dollars a year salary, Andrea Song Sharpen Tear. The theme song is by Thomas Bellbottom. Blues Lee and Travis Don't touch the hair Dutton. Most
Sport Probe is provided by Botany five hundred. Executive producers are Hey Baylor, Ben Bollen and exhausted prosecutor Noel Brown.
Ridicous Crime, Say It one More Time Piquious Crime.
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