In connection with an effort to compel testimony from Newsweek regarding the magazine’s December 2007 production schedule, one of Lowell’s colleagues—perhaps inadvertently—gave a rare pretrial glimpse inside the defense team’s strategy. According to one of the emails sent to an officer of Newsweek by an attorney in Lowell’s office at the law firm of Chadbourne & Parke in Washington, D.C.:

“The information regarding Newsweek’s publication schedule is extremely important to Mr. Edwards’ defense.  Specifically, Andrew Young, the government’s main witness against Mr. Edwards, has stated that he was inspired to assume public paternity of Mr. Edwards’ child Quinn on December 14, 2007 and that the inspiration for doing so came when he saw Newsweek’s December 24 edition entitled “The Sleeper” sitting on the seat of his car. … Young has stated that the magazine’s coverage of Mr. Edwards convinced him of Edwards’ viability as a candidate and motivated him to agree to assume paternity of the child.  As you can imagine, the government views this testimony as being central to its case.”

The 58-year-old Edwards is facing six felony counts in the action entitled The United States vs. Johnny Reid Edwards, which is set to go before a jury next week in Greensboro, N.C. (opening statements are scheduled to begin Monday, but may slip if jury selection isn’t completed). The charges against Edwards include conspiracy, making false statements, and four charges that he accepted illegal campaign contributions from two wealthy donors who had already given his campaign the maximum allowed. If convicted, Edwards could face a 30-year prison sentence and a fine of up to $1.5 million. Edwards has steadfastly maintained he is innocent of the charges.

But the public record proves Edwards is not so innocent of misleading the more than 100,000 supporters of his last presidential race who, collectively, helped him raise more than $23 million in campaign money. In multiple statements and media interviews, Edwards not only lied about an extramarital affair with his campaign videographer, Rielle Hunter (at first he calling it just a “tabloid trash story”), he repeatedly lied about being the father of their child. Ultimately, Edwards was forced to admit paternity and he publically apologized to his nearly 2-year-old daughter, Quinn, just days before a sizzling tell-all book was released, written by former top campaign staffer Andrew Young. 

“Not bad for an ex-truck driver!” he often said.

R-Jo was the sole distributor for the Key Food Cooperative Supermarket chain at the time. Key Food’s board of directors iincluded Pasquale Conte, who also served as a capo in the Gambino crime family. The dealings between Goldstein and Conte no doubt presented a professional challenge to Gayer, who had worked with the IRS for 10 years before signing on as R-Jo’s controller.

In 1989 the federal government expressed its view of the firm’s finances when it charged Goldstein, Gayer, and three other individuals with 58 counts of tax fraud and money laundering involving $10 million undeclared earnings.

Now come a report from veteran New York reporter Murray Weiss alleging more frisky hotel business. As part of its multiyear probe of Anna Gristina, the tabloid-dubbed “Soccer Mom Madam” arrested last month for allegedly running a $15 million high-end call-girl ring on the Upper East Side, Weiss reports that the Manhattan DA’s office interviewed a prostitute in 2008 who claimed to have conducted a bit of business with Edwards at a posh Upper East Side hotel the previous year. Investigators found the woman’s detailed description of the encounter credible enough to warrant follow-up digging—in the course of which they determined that Edwards had been fundraising in the city on the night in question.

Just hours after the story of Edwards’s alleged call-girl connection hit the Web, his attorneys went ballistic: denying the woman’s story, demanding a retraction, and making not-so-subtle threats against all those who dare repeat the charges. Intimidating stuff.