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Thompson Adviser Has Criminal Past
By Matthew Mosk
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 4, 2007; A01
Republican presidential candidate Fred D. Thompson has been crisscrossing
the country since early this summer on a private jet lent to him by a
businessman and close adviser who has a criminal record for drug dealing.
Thompson selected the businessman, Philip Martin, to raise seed money for
his White House bid. Martin is one of four campaign co-chairmen and the
head of a group called the "first day founders." Campaign aides jokingly
began to refer to Martin, who has been friends with Thompson since the
early 1990s, as the head of "Thompson's Airforce."
Thompson's frequent flights aboard Martin's twin-engine Cessna 560
Citation have saved him more than $100,000, because until the law changed
in September, campaign-finance rules allowed presidential candidates to
reimburse private jet owners for just a fraction of the true cost of
flights.
Martin entered a plea of guilty to the sale of 11 pounds of marijuana in
1979; the court withheld judgment pending completion of his probation. He
was charged in 1983 with violating his probation and with multiple counts
of felony bookmaking, cocaine trafficking and conspiracy. He pleaded no
contest to the cocaine-trafficking and conspiracy charges, which stemmed
from a plan to sell $30,000 worth of the drug, and was continued on
probation.
Thompson's campaign said the candidate was not aware of the multiple
criminal cases, for which Martin served no jail time. All are described
in public court records.
Karen Hanretty, Thompson's deputy communications director, said yesterday
that "Senator Thompson was unaware of the information until this
afternoon. Phil Martin has been a friend of the senator since the mid-
1990s and remains so today." Thompson communications director Todd Harris
added that Martin was not subjected to the campaign's standard vetting
process because "he's a longtime friend."
"There's not a campaign in the world that has the ability to research
every one of its supporters going back more than 20 years," Harris said.
Martin could not be reached in the past week, and lawyers for him in
Tennessee and Florida declined to comment on the criminal cases. Hanretty
said she forwarded detailed questions from The Washington Post to Martin
yesterday afternoon.
Martin, 49, is one of several top political fundraisers with a criminal
past to gain access this year to a presidential contender. Sen. Hillary
Rodham Clinton decided in September to return more than $800,000 raised
by Norman Hsu, one of her top bundlers, after newspapers disclosed that
he had been convicted of fraud and had an outstanding warrant for his
arrest.
Martin has been more than just a key fundraiser to Thompson, though. The
use of his plane eases a major logistical burden stemming from the
intense demands on presidential candidates this year for appearances in
more than 20 states holding early primaries. It also may have saved the
campaign at least $120,000, given that Federal Election Commission rules
allowed Thompson to reimburse Martin for the use of the private jet at
the commercial ticket rate until Congress changed the rules in September.
Thompson has reported reimbursing Martin $102,330, without specifying
precisely where he flew on the plane, or when. But a comparison of flight
records for the plane, kept by the tracking firm FlightAware, and news
accounts of Thompson's campaign appearances this year shows that since
June the plane has made more than two dozen stops that coincided with
Thompson campaign events.
The destinations included a GOP fundraising luncheon in South Carolina,
rallies in Houston and Dallas, a leadership conference in Indianapolis,
and the Minnesota State Fair. The most recent trip was on Thursday, when
the plane left Las Vegas with Thompson on board, bound for Washington,
where Thompson has long been an industry lobbyist.
The Web site JetTrip.com estimates that the hourly charter rate for use
of a plane similar to Martin's would be between $1,500 and $2,400, which
means these flights would normally cost at least $220,000, more than
double what Thompson paid.
Several other presidential candidates use private aircraft supplied by
key political supporters. Former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, for
instance, has paid $279,000 to Elliott Asset Management, a firm headed by
campaign adviser and New York financier Paul Singer, to reimburse the
firm for using an airplane. Democrat John Edwards has paid $628,052 to
longtime backer Fred Baron, a Dallas lawyer, for the use of his plane.
Martin's criminal history has not previously surfaced in news accounts
mentioning his role as a Thompson supporter. The Chattanooga Times Free
Press referred to him recently as Thompson's "mystery man."
Archived Florida court records provide details of the various cases
against Martin, including alleged sports-betting activity, a cocaine deal
he arranged with an undercover sheriff's deputy and carried out through a
middleman, and the sale of 11 pounds of marijuana to an undercover
detective for $3,400. Martin produced the marijuana from the trunk of his
1973 Cadillac as he and the detective were parked behind a Tampa area
department store, according to the arrest report.
According to court records, close friends and an ex-wife, Martin arrived
in Tennessee from Tampa about 1985 while serving probation for his
various offenses. He set up a series of businesses, starting with the
Puzzle's Pizza parlor. He opened a hardware store, and friends say he
began trying to recruit business partners for more ambitious real estate
ventures.
The fledgling developer also started to get involved in local and state
politics. Rep. Zach Wamp (R-Tenn.), a close friend of both Martin and
Thompson who was then a commercial real estate broker in Chattanooga,
said he and Martin met through their work and became friends because of a
mutual interest in Republican politics. "He always has been a mover and
shaker from the first time I knew him," Wamp said.
He and others said Martin, a gregarious and charismatic man, was a
natural in the world of political cocktail chatter and back-slapping.
Martin's first wife, Renee Whitfield, recalled that he and Wamp
campaigned together for a GOP gubernatorial candidate in 1994. "We rode
the bus to a county fair, all of us wearing our [campaign] T-shirts and
passing out literature," Whitfield recalled.
Martin began spending significant time with Thompson at fundraisers for
Wamp at a farm owned by one of Martin's close friends, Delwin L. Huggins,
according to Huggins's ex-wife, Badia McKee. After making small donations
to Wamp in 1992 and 1993, he sent his first substantial check -- $1,000 --
to Thompson in 1994.
Another $4,000 followed for Thompson's 1994 Senate bid, during which a
private jet owned by a wealthy Tennessee businessman, Steven A. McKenzie,
flew Martin, Thompson and others around the state, according to a source
with direct knowledge of the trips. McKenzie did not respond to multiple
telephone calls.
Martin "was always wanting to help candidates," Wamp said. "I assume
through 10 years of political involvement, when Fred came on the scene,
they immediately saw eye to eye." Martin and Thompson both stand well
over 6 feet and have outsize personalities. "Hail fellows well met," is
how David Copeland, a longtime local legislator from the Chattanooga
area, described Martin and Thompson. "They just stood out, and people
gravitated to them."
>From 1992 to 2002, Martin donated more than $75,000 to GOP candidates and
committees, according to FEC records. By 2000, he had become a major
political player in Tennessee Republican circles.
For much of his work, Martin partnered with Huggins, whose in-laws played
a key role in the Chattanooga area's commercial life. McKee is the
daughter of one of the area's wealthiest residents, Ellsworth McKee. The
family founded McKee Foods in 1934, and Badia McKee's sister Debbie was
the namesake of its most successful product, Little Debbie snack cakes.
Wamp said the McKees employed a good portion of the Chattanooga area, and
Ellsworth McKee has served as a sort of town father. As Ellsworth McKee's
son-in-law, Huggins was an important early contact for Martin, Wamp said.
With Huggins's help, and access to more than $40 million in loans and
investments from the McKees and others, court records show, Martin
started a series of companies. He helped run Soil Restoration and
Recycling LLC, and sought public funding to help clean up Chattanooga
Creek.
The company joined with another Martin concern, M&M Partners, to develop
a golf course and gated community to meet what they said was a growing
demand for luxury housing in a town near Chattanooga, Ooltewah, according
to news accounts. Martin also helped form Four Seasons Environmental,
Ooltewah Properties and Aquaterra Engineering, according to public
records.
The business ventures enabled Martin to accumulate personal wealth and
allowed a company he controls, Martin International Resorts and Aviation
LLC, to buy the jet used by Thompson.
But some of the business ventures gave rise to litigation. Martin took
Tennessee businessman McKenzie to court in 2006 because of a disagreement
over responsibility for the interest on a $127,500 loan. They settled the
matter privately, according to Martin's attorney. Businessman Scott
Hodges took Martin to court in 2005 over $220,000 in proceeds from a
development deal the two had struck. That case also ended with an
undisclosed out-of-court settlement, according to news reports and a
source.
But the most intractable case -- one that remains unresolved -- was the
one brought in 2003 by his early patron, Ellsworth McKee. McKee said in
court that Martin and Huggins each borrowed $8 million from him and
refused to repay it.
Martin's lawyer, John P. Konvalinka, has argued that the loan was
forgiven. He said that to some, Martin's various disputes over money may
seem significant, but in fact they are not. "For a man engaged in 1,000
transactions in a year, he doesn't have near the amount of litigation
that some of my clients do."
Martin now lives in Alabama. He works in an office next to a private
airstrip, where his small jet is based.
Research editor Alice Crites, staff writer Jonathan Weisman and database
editor Sarah Cohen contributed to this report.
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"All are lunatics, but he who can analyze his delusion is called a
philosopher." - Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914)
"Being ignorant is not such a shame as being unwilling to learn." -
Poor Richard's Almanack, 1758 (Benjamin Franklin)
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