A year after the federal government began looking into Mayor Tom Murphy's election-eve 2001 deal with the city firefighters union, prosecutors may be changing the course of their investigation.
The government is considering the federal mail-fraud statute as a potential means of charging Murphy in the reported awarding of a favorable labor contract to the firefighters for their endorsement in the 2001 Democratic mayoral primary. Murphy went on to win the nomination over then-City Council President Bob O'Connor by 699 votes.
Word of the possible mail-fraud prosecution emerged after Murphy's attorneys met with federal authorities in an effort to persuade them not to seek an indictment.
Interviews with sources working on both sides of the Murphy investigation have provided a glimpse into a part of the federal grand jury system rarely seen by outsiders: The back-scene maneuvering in which each side takes the measure of the other, dropping hints about what legal strategies might be in the offing.
While investigators have focused on a meeting that Murphy and the firefighters union president, Joe King, had over lunch at The Roadhouse, a Route 51 restaurant, in 2001, the mail fraud statute could be used because virtually every aspect of everyday commerce relies, directly or indirectly, on the use of the U.S. mails.
Much speculation on both sides has centered on Section 1346 of the mail-fraud statutes. The section was adopted Nov. 18, 1988, at the request of the Reagan administration after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a conviction, saying the government had unreasonably expanded the interpretation of mail fraud.
The new section redefined a "scheme or artifice to defraud" to include "a scheme or artifice to deprive another of the intangible right of honest services."
Under such a prosecution, Murphy would essentially be charged with "defrauding'' Pittsburgh taxpayers of the honest performance of his duties. The statute's language, said one lawyer connected to the case, could be broad enough to encompass the deal they believe took place between Murphy and King.
Prosecution sources have indicated that a decision on whether to seek an indictment against Murphy will be made before the end of the summer.
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