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| Kevin Johnson, Mayor of Sacramento |
If you were watching closely, you might've seen Kevin Johnson, the former NBA guard who's now mayor of Sacramento, sitting courtside at Staples Center during Game 4 of the Clippers-Thunder series. His arm was around his wife, Michelle Rhee, and the two seemed to preside over the action, conspicuous by design—their very presence in the fancy seats a further rebuke to the man whom Johnson had recently helped to oust from the NBA, Clippers owner Donald Sterling.
Johnson and Rhee seem to be everywhere these days. There was a joint appearance at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. There was another at the Kentucky Derby. And of course before either of those was Johnson's cameo in the Sterling saga. Called in as an unofficial representative of the players, Johnson lobbied NBA commissioner Adam Silver to come down hard on Sterling. After the announcement of Sterling's lifetime ban and $2.5 million fine, The New York Times's Harvey Araton wrote: "[I]t is apparent that the league's response was shaped as much by the influence of a player turned politician who has no official affiliation with the NBA as it was by Silver's conviction."
It was a bitterly funny turn of events for some longtime Johnson observers, who remember whenhe was the guy making repulsive admissions on tape while speaking with a much younger female with whom he never should've been involved. At the very least, they believe Johnson—with an assist from Rhee—earned a lifetime ban from the moral high ground many years ago. "All I can say is the factually supported charges against Johnson certainly bring into question holding him out to be a moral compass," says New York attorney Gerald Walpin.
From 2007 to 2009, Walpin was inspector general for the Corporation for National Community Service. That's the federal agency that oversees AmeriCorps. On that job, Walpin investigated St. HOPE Academy, a group Johnson founded to run charter schools in his hometown of Sacramento that got lots of AmeriCorps money. In 2008, Walpin issued a referral to the localU.S. Attorney for the "criminal and civil prosecution" of Johnson for "obtaining by law federal funds under a grant," and the "filing of false and fraudulent claims" in connection with subsidies totaling $845,018.75. The allegations included lots of bogus accounting. People on AmeriCorps's dime as St. HOPE tutors, according to a joint report on Walpin's investigationissued by Congressional Republicans, were being asked to "wash his car [and] run personal errands" for Johnson.
But the seamiest stuff in those files, and there's a lot of it, comes when investigators take a break from possible fiscal malfeasance to accuse Johnson of physical misdeeds. According to theoversight committee's report, Walpin included allegations of "inappropriate sexual conduct" against Johnson in his criminal referral to the U.S. attorney's office because they could "seriously impact ... both the security of young [AmeriCorps] Members placed in the care of grantees and ... the ability of AmeriCorps to continue to attract volunteers." Johnson's past, as outlined by the committee, also includes alleged hush-money payments to make all this bad news go away. Judging by the non-mention in The New York Times's opus, it largely has gone away.
According to the reports, while investigators were in Sacramento looking into the misuse of funds, they "became aware of allegations of inappropriate contact between Johnson and three female St. HOPE students." Walpin's office later "uncovered evidence of two other female St. HOPE students reporting Johnson for inappropriate sexual conduct towards them."
Walpin's team also was told of various efforts by Johnson and his allies to stonewall the investigations, including one alleged victim who'd said Johnson "offered her $1,000 a month," ostensibly in exchange for her silence.
Read the full story: www.deadspin.com
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