HOUSTON — Prosecutors are prepared to use information from people involved in Rep. Tom DeLay's fundraising organization, including out-of-state business executives, against him in an effort to prove that he conspired to route illegal corporate money into elections, attorneys and officials close to the case said Thursday.
That information -- some of it contained in documents, such as a note reminding DeLay to call an executive whose company was preparing to write a $25,000 check -- would be used at trial to suggest that the indicted congressman was directly involved in the fundraising setup, the attorneys and officials said.
Still, analysts said it was not enough for Dist. Atty. Ronald Earle, who is leading the prosecution, to show that DeLay helped raise money from corporations, even though Texas law bans corporate contributions to legislative candidates.
To convict DeLay, Earle must show that the U.S. House majority leader intentionally agreed to commit a felony.
Earle would have to show, essentially, that DeLay knew the corporate money he was raising was going to be routed to Republican legislative candidates.
For that, Earle would need an inside witness to turn state's evidence -- and a furious parlor game has begun in Texas over whom that might be, and what that person might be willing to say at trial.
"He's got an opera singer," one Democrat said.
David H. Berg, a Houston attorney who wrote a book on trial law, has argued numerous conspiracy cases and is far less certain that Earle can secure a conviction.
"Ronnie Earle has got to be holding a good hand that he's just not showing," Berg said.
A Texas grand jury indicted DeLay on Wednesday, charging him with conspiracy, which forced him to step down, for now, from his leadership post in Congress.
The indictment focuses on a transaction during the 2002 election cycle in Texas, when Republicans, long the minority party in Texas, took control of the state's political structure and helped secure DeLay's power base in Washington.
In that process, a committee DeLay founded to assist conservative politicians -- Texans for a Republican Majority -- collected money from corporations. The committee, known as TRMPAC, then wrote a $190,000 check to an arm of the Republican National Committee in Washington.
According to prosecutors, the national committee then distributed the money back to seven Texas legislative candidates.
