Investigator admits seeking Ritter info for campaign ad

Plot thickens over access to off-limits criminal database

By Lynn Bartels, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published November 21, 2007 at 12:30 a.m.

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Cory Voorhis leaves the Alfred A. Arraj Federal Courthouse with his wife, Paula, on Tuesday afternoon. Voorhis, an Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agent, pleaded not guilty Tuesday to three misdemeanor counts in connection with accessing a federal criminal database.

Correction

This story should have said the Denver district attorney's office said it accessed the same database to respond to inquiries from news reporters. A full statement from the DA's office on the case is online at www.denverda.org/News_Release/ Setting_the_Record_Straight.htm

A private investigator from Texas hired last year to dig into Gov. Bill Ritter's background admitted Tuesday that he asked "a buddy" to access an off-limits criminal database.

Kenny Rodgers, 57, said his friend, who worked for the Harris County District Attorney's Office in Houston at the time, looked up information kept by the National Crime Information Center, known as NCIC.

"My buddy who looked it up is in deep trouble because of me," Rodgers told the Rocky Mountain News. Rodgers said he was told the information was needed for a campaign ad.

In a separate incident, a federal agent in Colorado has been charged with accessing the NCIC database - which is to be used for law enforcement purposes only - and providing information to Ritter's 2006 gubernatorial opponent, Republican Bob Beauprez. Beauprez later ran ads critical of Ritter, a Democrat and former Denver district attorney, for giving plea bargains to illegal immigrants.

Lawyers for Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Cory Voorhis filed a motion this month in U.S. District Court in Denver, contending selective prosecution. They said officials in district attorneys' offices in Denver and Harris counties accessed the same database for similar information and were not charged.

Voorhis' supporters and some Republicans have questioned whether Denver District Attorney's Office staffers were assisting their former colleague with his campaign when they accessed the database.

DA denies wrongdoing

Lynn Kimbrough, spokeswoman for Denver District Attorney Mitch Morrissey, said the office has done nothing wrong and its access to NCIC records was done in order to answer questions from the news media and a Ritter campaign staffer about the Beauprez ad.

On Tuesday, the office posted on its Web site a notice titled "Setting the record straight," outlining its role in the case.

The posting came a day after agents from the FBI and Colorado Bureau of Investigation interviewed employees in the DA's office about the sequence of events surrounding the database access, Kimbrough said.

Who Rodgers was working for when he sought information on an illegal immigration case is unclear. He said he was hired by a Pennsylvania man doing research on Ritter's cases, but he's not sure who hired the researcher.

The motion filed by Voorhis' attorneys states that the Colorado Republican Party hired Rodgers, but that's news to Bob Martinez, who was state chairman in 2006.

"I have no idea what the heck they're talking about," Martinez said. "If someone was hired, it was without my knowledge."

Rodgers also was doing work for another Colorado Republican organization, the Trailhead Group, founded by prominent Republicans including former Gov. Bill Owens.

Trailhead no longer exists, but its former director, Alan Philp, said Tuesday that that Rodgers was researching an unrelated Ritter case for his group and that they never discussed any illegal immigration cases.

"Trailhead had no involvement in the production of the (Beauprez) ad, any discussions leading up to the ad or any research on the ad," Philp said.

Rodgers said he was directed to find out which county in California had prosecuted an illegal immigrant who had been given a plea bargain by Ritter's office. He said he was told it was needed for a Beauprez ad.

Overwhelmed by support

Voorhis, who has been suspended with pay, pleaded not guilty Tuesday to three misdemeanor counts of accessing NCIC.

Supporters, including retired law enforcement officials who had never met Voorhis, jammed all four rows in the courtroom. "I'm overwhelmed," Voorhis said of the support.

A trial date in U.S. District Court in Denver will be set soon.

"Our position is (Voorhis) didn't do anything wrong and we intend to prove that," his attorney, Bill Taylor, said after the hearing.

Kimbrough said her office accessed NCIC in order to answer reporters’ questions and a question from a Ritter campaign staffer about Beauprez’s ad.

She said they were particularly interested in the case of an illegal immigrant prosecuted in California for sexually assaulting a minor who earlier got a plea deal from Ritter. The cases involved two different names.

The immigrant used a different name in California, making it all but impossible for reporters and others to independently verify the details through public records.

Kimbrough said she explained the dilemma to Assistant District Attorney Chuck Lepley. He then had an employee look up the information on the NCIC database.

The search confirmed the two names were used by the same person and that information was provided to those who had asked.

"Nothing that was asked for was confidential or privileged," Lepley said.

Kimbrough said the office has accessed the NCIC database on other occasions to answer questions from the media.

But Colorado Republican Party chairman Dick Wadhams said he believes Ritter's former colleagues looked up the information in order to help his campaign.

The information was accessed at 3:46 p.m. on Oct. 12, 2006. By the end of the working day, Ritter's campaign had asked the CBI to request an investigation into alleged misuse of the database by the Beauprez camp.

A group called Cory Legal Defense, which is raising money to help pay Voorhis' legal fees, has asked the U.S. Attorney's Office to empanel a grand jury to determine whether others violated the same laws Voorhis is accused of breaking.

Ritter's spokesman, Evan Dreyer, was critical of the grand jury request.

"In his earlier court motion, Voorhis admitted he broke the law to access a secure federal government database," Dreyer said. "He and his supporters are doing what they've been doing for a year - grasping at straws and trying to deflect attention away from their own wrongdoing."

The players

Those caught up in the case of accessing an off-limits federal criminal database during the gubernatorial campaign last year include:

*Cory Voorhis, a federal agent with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, charged with exceeding his authorized access to the National Crime Information Center

*Gov. Bill Ritter, former Denver district attorney and the Democratic gubernatorial candidate in 2006

*Bob Beauprez, the GOP gubernatorial candidate in 2006, who used information from Voorhis in a TV ad attacking Ritter's record of plea bargaining cases involving illegal immigrants

*Kenny Rodgers, a Texas private investigator who had a friend access NCIC to find out information on an illegal-immigration case Ritter's office prosecuted

*Chuck Lepley, assistant district attorney in the Denver DA's Office, who had an employee check NCIC to verify information about the ad sought by the media and a Ritter campaign staffer

*Bill Taylor,Voorhis' attorney and a former prosecutor who worked for five years under Ritter

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