Third Circuit Reverses Conviction of Former Texas House Majority Leader

On Thursday, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the 2010 money-laundering conviction of former Texas House Majority leader Tom DeLay on the grounds of insufficient evidence. The Travis County District Attorney, Rosemary Lehmberg has expressed that they would be appealing the decision before the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.

DeLay, who received news of the decision while attending a prayer meeting in Washington welcomed the ruling and expressed that he was disparaged by the "outrageous criminalization of politics."


The politician had been convicted in November 2010 by a Texas jury on accusations of funneling $190,000 in corporate donations made to Texas House Republican candidates in 2002.

Prosecutors claimed that direct contribution to political candidates violated Texas's state laws and the contributions had helped DeLay to obtain approval for his redistricting plan for Texas. DeLay's redistricting plan has been held as pivotal for the election of Republicans to Congress in 2004.

The three-year sentence imposed on DeLay had been delayed while appeal was pending. And now, with the Third Circuit opinion illustrating lack of sufficient evidence, there is scant chance for another move before the courts to survive. Given that criminal conviction requires strict interpretation of the law and conviction to be beyond reasonable doubt.

In its 22-page detailed opinion, the appeals court said that the prosecution had "failed in its burden to prove that the funds that were delivered to the seven candidates were ever tainted."

The jury in Austin had found DeLay guilty of money laundering and conspiracy to commit money laundering on the premise that the money delivered to Republican candidates was tainted by illegalities.

In fact, even though state law in Texas prohibits direct corporate contribution to political candidates, the contribution in this case was not specified piecemeal. A total sum of $190,000 had gone to the Washington-based Republican National Committee, which had then sliced up and distributed the sum to seven Texas House candidates.

To prove that this was a direct contribution, the moderating function of the RNC would need to be ignored and the prosecution would have to establish that specific corporate donations had originated for specific candidates and were conveyed to them intact without moderation. This, however, is not what the court records show.

In fact, Justice Melissa Goodwin observed that instead of exhibiting malicious intention, "the evidence shows that the defendants were attempting to comply with the election code limitations on corporate contributions."