Bribed Rate Case Headed to U.S. Supreme Court

Those six consumers who believe a bribed 1989 Corporation Commission vote should not be allowed to stand are headed to the U.S. Supreme Court in their fight against the state.

In a story followed for years by OK Energy Today, the consumers include a retired FBI agent, a retired Air Force General,  a former City Mayor, an Oklahoma Corporation Commissioner who once worked undercover for the FBI in the case, a city businessman and others. They believe the vote should have been overturned and that consumers across Oklahoma are due a $16 billion refund from ATT.

The group released an announcement over the weekend:

“The fight to return billions to Oklahoma ratepayers is headed to the United States Supreme Court.  Seeking relief from rulings at both the Corporation Commission and the Oklahoma Supreme Court that have inexplicably allowed a bribed order to stand for almost 30 years, applicants in the AT&T bribery refund case announced in a filing Friday they are taking their search for justice to the nation’s highest court. 

The applicants are six prominent citizens who, as phone customers of AT&T, were defrauded when an attorney for the company (then-Southwestern Bell) bribed Corporation Commissioner Robert Hopkins in a 1989 rate case.  The bribed vote allowed AT&T to keep millions in excess revenues resulting from a federal tax change rather than refunding that money to ratepayers as most of the state’s other public utilities did.  Ironically, the 1986 corporate income tax rate reduction that precipitated the case was very similar to the recent Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. 

“We took on this fight when the Attorney General stopped representing Oklahoma ratepayers and started defending AT&T,” said bribery refund applicant and Nichols Hills Mayor Sody Clements.  “We hoped the Corporation Commission and the Oklahoma Supreme Court would finally do the right thing – declare once and for all that bribed votes don’t count in this state, and give the billions stolen by AT&T back to the ratepayers.  Unfortunately everyone has passed the buck and claimed it’s someone else’s problem to fix.  We believe the buck will stop at the United States Supreme Court.” 

Despite new evidence of intrinsic fraud at both the Corporation Commission and the Oklahoma Supreme Court, the OCC dismissed the AT&T bribery refund application in September 2016.  In a 2-1 vote, Commissioners Todd Hiett and Dana Murphy agreed with AT&T that the commission was powerless to do anything about the bribery and decided neither the application nor the new evidence were worth hearing.  

Commissioner Bob Anthony, who worked with the FBI to uncover the bribery, vehemently disagreed.  “By not hearing this case, the Oklahoma Corporation Commission forfeits an opportunity to perform its Constitutional duty of ‘correcting abuses’ and joins AT&T in declaring to the public that ‘bribery wins’ and ‘bribed votes do count’ in Oklahoma,” Anthony wrote in a 200-page dissenting opinion. “Respectfully, I dissent.” 

The AT&T bribery refund applicants immediately appealed the OCC’s decision to the Oklahoma Supreme Court.  But just days before Christmas 2017, the state’s highest court issued a decision upholding the OCC’s dismissal while completely ignoring both the new evidence of fraud and the constitutional questions about bribery raised in the applicants’ appeal.  Notably, Chief Justice Douglas L. Combs dissented from the decision of the court’s other justices. 

“Eight justices of the Oklahoma Supreme Court have joined a long list of Corporation Commissioners and Attorneys General who have not just neglected their sworn duties as state officeholders, they have willfully failed to perform them,” wrote applicant and former commanding general of Tinker Air Force Base Richard A. Burpee in a scathing response.  Calling their failure to overturn the bribery “dereliction of duty,” Burpee said, “These officials should be relieved of their duties. … In the military, they would be court-martialed.” 

In September 2016, the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) cited “compelling evidence of intrinsic fraud utilized by Southwestern Bell Telephone Company” and “criminal activity” in a filing seeking to join the AT&T bribery refund case.  Although the OCC dismissed the DOD’s motion when it dismissed the bribery refund application, a similar attempt to join the case at the federal level would likely be accepted.  Refunds due for thousands of phone lines at military installations and federal agencies across the state are at stake. 

“The bribery in this case isn’t alleged; it was proven beyond a reasonable doubt and upheld on appeal,” said former Special Agent-in-Charge of the FBI in Oklahoma Bob Ricks who assisted in the original investigation and is another of the bribery refund applicants taking the case to the United States Supreme Court.  “I’m confident the U.S. Supreme Court will see this case for what it is – a bribed vote that has been allowed to fester into one of the largest cases of corporate fraud in American history.” 

“The old adage tells us that ‘justice delayed is justice denied,’” wrote retired FBI agent Oliver “Buck” Revell in an open letter to Oklahoma lawmakers.  Revell had oversight of the FBI’s investigation into the bribery at the OCC when he served as the FBI director’s deputy in charge of Criminal Investigative, Counter-Terrorism and Counter-Intelligence activities at the bureau’s headquarters in Washington, D.C.  “The victims of bribery have waited long enough. … Honest citizens are asking, ‘Do bribed votes really count in Oklahoma?’  The answer will speak volumes for the state of justice – and the sanctity of an honest vote – in today’s Oklahoma.” 

“There is more than just billions of dollars at stake – Oklahoma’s reputation is on the line,” said bribery refund applicant and businessman Rodd Moesel.  “For decades, there were massive corruption schemes among county commissioners, corporation commissioners and even at the Oklahoma Supreme Court itself.  Some people want to say that’s all water under the bridge.  But in the last 15 years, we’ve also had an insurance commissioner and a state auditor convicted of bribery.  Now, today, we have allegations of misappropriated funds at the state Health Department and numerous sheriffs and state legislators recently charged with or convicted of wrongdoing.  Getting justice in this case would finally send a message that we’re not going to do business that way in this state anymore.” 

“Sometimes it takes an outsider like the United States Supreme Court to hold up a mirror and force you to take a hard look at yourself,” said Mayor Clements.  “There are folks in the business community that want to ignore this case and pretend the bribery never happened.  But this idea that ‘bribed votes do count’ if you’re a big corporation willing to make big campaign contributions and drag things out in court is contrary to the fundamental values of honesty and fair play held by most Oklahomans.  We’ve taken up this cause on behalf of Oklahoma ratepayers because we believe – and we believe they believe – it’s the right thing to do.” 

“The unconstitutional defects of the bribed order should have been corrected, and refunds ordered, decades ago when the bribery convictions were confirmed by the United States Court of Appeals,” said expert witness and bribery refund applicant James Proctor.  Proctor is the former director of the commission’s Public Utility Division.  “Justice further delayed means the potential refund amount will be that much bigger when justice is finally served.  At 11.589% interest compounded annually, the $16 billion refund figure estimated in 2015 is growing by more than $100 million each month that the bribed vote remains on the books.  That’s serious money, even in Washington D.C.”