Friday, February 8, 2013

 Former CPRIT officials’ House panel testimony canceled























AUSTIN — Two former high-ranking officials at Texas’ cancer-fighting agency were not allowed to testify to a legislative committee Wednesday because their remarks could have given them immunity from possible indictment or prosecution.
Dr. Alfred Gilman, a Nobel laureate and former chief scientific officer of the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas, and former executive director Bill Gimson were scheduled to appear before the House Appropriations Committee.
Rep. Jim Pitts, the Waxahachie Republican who is the committee’s chairman, said he canceled the testimony after hearing concerns Tuesday afternoon from the Travis County district attorney’s office and the state attorney general’s office. The district attorney is conducting a criminal investigation into how CPRIT has awarded grants, and the attorney general’s office is pursuing a civil inquiry.
State law bars indictment or prosecution of anyone who testifies in front of the Legislature while claiming that something they say may incriminate them, said Gregg Cox, director of the Travis County district attorney’s Public Integrity Unit.
“If someone shows up and tells the Legislature ‘I think I might incriminate myself if I answer these questions,’ and if the legislative committee has them go ahead and answer it, the statute says they may not be indicted or prosecuted for that subject matter,” Cox said.
“It’s not just that it would render the statement inadmissible and you could still prosecute it. It bars prosecution,” he added.
The section of state law is rarely invoked at the Capitol, said Hugh L. Brady, director of the Legislative Lawyering Clinic at the University of Texas School of Law.
Prosecutors are close to presenting evidence to a grand jury in their criminal investigation of CPRIT. The Public Integrity Unit of the Travis County district attorney’s office investigates corruption allegations against public officials statewide.
In cases in which law enforcement officers have not been involved in investigations, as with the CPRIT inquiry, prosecutors often take testimony from witnesses in front of a grand jury, said Cox, who added he could not identify those witnesses or say how many there would be.
“We’re a ways from necessarily presenting indictment. We still need to gather more evidence and secure testimony,” he said.
Impact on inquiry
Cox said the district attorney’s office also was concerned about what impact legislative testimony by Gilman and Gimson would have on that criminal investigation.
“If they had testified in this open forum, both of them would have been in the room and both of them would have heard what the other said. That is just something we want to avoid at this point,” said Cox, who said he could not comment on whether Gilman and Gimson have been notified that they are targets of the criminal investigation.
The district attorney’s office opened its investigation in November after CPRIT disclosed that it had awarded $11 million to Peloton Therapeutics, a company on the campus of UT Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, without the required commercial or scientific review.
CPRIT said Gilman and Jerald “Jerry” Cobbs, the agency’s former chief commercialization officer, exchanged emails in 2010 about Peloton’s proposal. CPRIT said Cobbs, who resigned his post in November, improperly placed the award on the oversight committee’s agenda.
In late December, CPRIT notified The Dallas Morning News that, at the request of the Travis County district attorney’s office, it would not release public records, including emails, about the Peloton grant. Cox at the time said release of the records could influence what key witnesses tell investigators.
Cox said Wednesday that he could not comment on what testimony he would take from witnesses in front of a grand jury.
Asked if it would focus solely on the Peloton grant, Cox replied: “I believe that it will be broader than that, but it will still be somewhat narrowly focused. Peloton will be included in what we’re going to work on.”
If indictments are sought from a grand jury, that would occur once the investigation is completed, Cox said.
Shannon Ratliff, an Austin attorney who said he began to represent Gilman a few days ago, said prosecutors have not questioned Gilman and he has not received a subpoena to testify in front of a grand jury.
Computer seized
Ratliff confirmed that investigators seized the computer Gilman used when he was CPRIT’s chief scientific officer.
He said Gilman, a former dean and provost at UT Southwestern Medical Center, did not violate any laws while working at the small state agency.
“Based on everything I’ve found, and we’ve been able to look at, I don’t think he’s done anything wrong and I’d be surprised if there is anything out there that would indicate otherwise,” Ratliff said.
Gimson, a former chief operating officer at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who stepped down in December as CPRIT’s executive director, did not return messages seeking comment.
Ratliff said Gilman had planned to tell legislators Wednesday that he resigned as chief scientific officer at CPRIT because he discovered that the agency’s process was not followed in the review of a $20 million grant to a Houston “incubator.” The project was designed to link scientists and business experts in hopes of bringing new anti-cancer technologies and therapies to market.
Gilman would have told legislators, according to Ratliff, that nearly all of CPRIT’s 500 grants made since 2009 were “handled appropriately, and it’s a shame to let a few of these aberrations to deflect CPRIT from its function.”
Jimmy Mansour, the Austin businessman who has served as chairman of CPRIT’s oversight committee since its inception, said Wednesday that it’s difficult for him and others to answer many of the questions from legislators without hearing from Gilman and Gimson.
Glenn Smith, a director of the liberal activist group Progress Texas Political Action Committee, said he was glad investigators succeeded in halting the scheduled testimony of Gilman and Gimson.
“Inadvertent granting of immunity on a criminal matter to anybody would be tragic in terms of public accountability. So I’m glad they caught it, and it’s a sign that this criminal investigation is still moving ahead 150 miles per hour,” Smith said.
“A witness called by either house or by a legislative committee does not have a privilege to refuse to testify to a fact or produce a document on the ground the testimony or document may tend to disgrace the person or otherwise make the person infamous.”
“The legislature may require a person to testify or produce a document concerning a matter under inquiry before either house or a legislative committee even if the person claims that the testimony or document may incriminate him.”
“If a person testifies or produces a document while claiming that the testimony or document may incriminate him, the person may not be indicted or prosecuted for any transaction, matter, or thing about which the person truthfully testified or produced evidence.”
“A witness has a right to counsel when testifying before the legislature or a legislative committee.”

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