El-Amin pleads guilty to bribery

The St. Louis Beacon is reporting that Rep. T.D. El-Amin, D-St. Louis, pleaded guilty today to taking a bribe from a gas station owner.

From Jo Mannies' article:

Court documents said that between March 1 and June 1 of this year, El-Amin met a number of times with the owner of a gas station and convenience store in his district; the owner was identified only as John Doe.

In the meetings, which were recorded on audio and video, the station owner said he was being subjected to nuisance citations and summons by the city. The documents said El-Amin agreed to help the owner deal with the problem in exchange for a series of payments totaling $2,100.

At a news conference after the court proceedings, John Gillies, the FBI special agent in charge of the St. Louis office, said more cases like that of El-Amin will be coming. He said since his office set up a special unit to combat official corruption, an increasing number of witnesses have come forward complaining they have been taken advantage of by public officials.

"We'll continue to weed out corruption," Gillies said, adding that it "takes a lot of courage" for the public to cooperate with authorities.

Read the rest here.

Missouri Republican Party executive director Lloyd Smith released the following statement on El-Amin's guilty plea:

“Our elected officials are expected to put service over self, but Democrat State Rep. T.D. El-Amin committed the gravest violation of the public trust—acting for personal profit rather than for the Missourians he represents.  He is the fourth St. Louis-area Democrat who has admitted violating federal laws in the past two years—following State Sen. Jeff Smith and State Reps. Steve Brown and John Bowman.  Whether the efforts of Smith and Brown to lie to federal investigators, Bowman’s role in a credit card kickback scheme, or El-Amin’s acceptance of bribes, these actions are wrong and cannot be tolerated.”