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July 19, 2008, 11:33PM
Justice Department broadening investigation of Kent
Sale of home and gift reporting being examinedBy LISE OLSEN
Copyright 2008
Houston ChronicleA Justice Department investigation into the sexual conduct of U.S. District Judge Samuel Kent has expanded to include allegations that he accepted but failed to report gifts and also sold his home in a deal arranged by a lawyer with dozens of cases in his court, Kent's own attorney and other lawyers have confirmed.
The ongoing investigation was launched last year after Kent's former case manager complained that the judge sexually molested her. Since then, several prominent attorneys have been subpoenaed by federal prosecutors to appear before a Houston grand jury involving other allegations of judicial misconduct, according to documents and interviews obtained by the Chronicle.
Months ago, investigators began asking about parties, a 2001 trip to London and meals attorneys had bought for Kent at Galveston restaurants — often on days they did business in his court, lawyers and former co-workers said.
According to Kent's attorney, Dick DeGuerin, they also requested records about a real estate deal in which one of those attorneys, Kurt Arnold, helped persuade his mother to buy Kent's home in the city of Galveston.
Under federal disclosure rules, a federal judge normally is not required to report income earned from the sale of a primary home.
At issue, though, is whether the attorney's assistance would have amounted to a gift or item of value that the judge should have disclosed — or whether the arrangements constituted a criminal conflict of interest, experts on judicial conduct cases said.
Randy Schaffer, a Houston attorney who represents Arnold, said his client violated no laws. He refused comment about the judge's conduct.
"I think this is essentially a situation where a young lawyer has been caught in the crossfire of the government going after Kent," Schaffer said.
The 2006 sale price was $339,500 for the 64-year-old house in the Denver Court neighborhood a few blocks inland from the seawall. The property is valued at $224,090 by the Galveston County Appraisal District. However, appraisals obtained by the buyer and seller were closer to the sale price, DeGuerin and Schaffer said.
Commission savingsBecause Arnold found the buyer, Kent negotiated a reduced real estate commission of $5,000, according to DeGuerin and sale documents. That's a savings of $15,370 for Kent compared with the standard 6 percent fee for a typical house sale with two agents.
DeGuerin argued the price was fair and the reduced commission justified, because only Kent used a Realtor and that Realtor didn't find the buyer.
He insists the house deal was legitimate, that Kent always treated all attorneys fairly and the judge has done nothing improper or illegal. He claims the feds are going all out because a federal judge "is a big pelt."
"I think they're trying to find anything that they can, and this should be a dead end," DeGuerin said. Kent repeatedly has refused comment, though he authorized DeGuerin to provide responses and share documents with the Chronicle.
DeGuerin also has called any alleged sexual contact between Kent and his former case manager, Cathy McBroom, "enthusiastically consensual."
McBroom made a formal judicial misconduct complaint in May 2007, alleging that Kent twice improperly touched her under her clothing and made obscene proposals.
Case called 'slam dunk'Kent received a written reprimand in September for sexual harassment and "inappropriate behavior" from the judicial council of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. He was later reassigned to Houston after serving nearly 18 years as Galveston's lone federal judge.
Meanwhile, McBroom's attorney, Rusty Hardin, formally requested a separate criminal investigation.
In early 2008, investigators, overseen by prosecutor Peter Ainsworth of the Washington, D.C.-based Public Integrity Section, called several court security guards and other federal court employees who knew McBroom to testify before a grand jury. Later, investigators began asking attorneys who practiced in Kent's court about alleged misbehavior and gifts.
Hardin, McBroom's attorney and a former prosecutor, said he is frustrated that it has taken so long to review a sexual molestation case he calls a "slam dunk." He said he does not understand why federal prosecutors seem more interested in gifts and real estate.
Kent's disclosure forms for 2001-2006 show he reported receiving no gifts since 2002.
In 2001, an insurance company reimbursed Kent an unspecified amount for "round trip transportation only" to appear at a London conference.
The same year, Richard Melancon, an attorney friend who had dozens of cases in Kent's court, gave Kent a catered wedding reception the judge valued at $1,000. A few months after the party, Kent's supervising federal judges abruptly reassigned Melancon's cases to another court. Melancon has since retired. It was in 2002 that Kent last reported a gift: a $300 crystal bowl from another attorney.
But in interviews, former court employees and attorneys say that Kent continued to receive expensive lunches and drinks from other lawyer friends.
In recent months, investigators requested documents about the sale of the judge's former Galveston home to the mother of Arnold, according to DeGuerin and court records.
Arnold, who graduated with honors from UT law school, founded his own Houston firm not long after serving as Kent's law clerk in 2002.
Records show Kent put his two-story Galveston home on the market in mid-2006. At first there were no takers.
After Kent reduced the price by $10,000, DeGuerin said, Arnold and another local attorney, Anthony Buzbee, who practiced in Kent's court, both expressed an interest in buying it.
Buzbee and Arnold both served as Kent's former law clerks.
But Buzbee, who also runs a property management company, said that when the judge asked him about it he refused.
"I told him 'No,' in no uncertain terms," Buzbee said. He said the older home in an established Galveston neighborhood did not meet his property investment standards.
"It's not a good rental house. It doesn't have central heat or air," Buzbee said.
Buzbee and another attorney with knowledge about the sale said the judge actively solicited offers from at least three attorneys who practiced in his court at the time.
Kent also sought a legal opinion from his law clerk at the time, Carey D. Worrell, a Harvard law school graduate, on whether any "barriers, ethical or otherwise" would prevent him from selling his house to a lawyer who practiced in his court, according to DeGuerin and the clerk's letter.
Worrell concluded on July 19, 2006, that such a sale was not "expressly prohibited" if the deal was for the "fair market value" and involved Realtors representing both sides.
But she pointed out that the code of conduct for federal judges "contains the only language arguably critical of the contemplated transaction." The canon says, "A judge should avoid impropriety and the appearance of impropriety in all activities."
A few weeks later, Kent sold the home to Arnold's mother.
At least 10 subpoenaedDeGuerin said Arnold received no favors in return. Arnold's mother, who lives in Corpus Christi, used the house as rental property. She did not return messages left by the Chronicle.
In previous interviews, Arnold has defended Kent as an intelligent jurist who treated all attorneys fairly.
Tom Fitton, president of the Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit Judicial Watch, said the sale "has all the hallmarks of something that's not on the up and up. ... A full investigation may exonerate (Kent) — but a full investigation must be done."
In late June, U.S. District Judge G. Thomas Porteous Jr., of New Orleans, was recommended by a national judicial disciplinary body to be considered for impeachment partly because he failed to report gifts or income received from attorneys who practiced before him, records show.
The 5th Circuit judicial council, which oversaw its own investigations of Porteous and Kent last year, has deferred judicial disciplinary action against Kent while the Justice Department's criminal probe continues.
At least 10 attorneys who practiced in Kent's court have been subpoenaed, though several chose to give voluntary statements instead of appear before the grand jury, several attorneys cooperating with the investigation said.
Maritime cases handledThe list included some of Kent's closest associates, including Arnold, Buzbee, and Francis Spagnoletti, another longtime friend of Kent's who accompanied him on his 2001 trip to London. Together, their three firms handled more than half of the 500 maritime cases filed in Kent's court between 2003 and 2007, a Chronicle analysis of federal electronic court records shows.
Buzbee and Spagnoletti "had nothing but good things to say about Sam," DeGuerin said. DeGuerin said he didn't know whether Arnold had testified yet. Spagnoletti did not return phone calls.
Kent has given a voluntary statement to the FBI and is eager to cooperate with prosecutors — but has not been contacted, DeGuerin said.
Staff writer Harvey Rice contributed to this report.lise.olsen@chron.com * * * *
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