PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — In the federal corruption trial of labor leader John Dougherty and Councilmember Bobby Henon, prosecutors switched the focus back to Dougherty on Thursday, calling on Rich Lazer, the Philadelphia deputy mayor for labor, to testify.
Lazer is not accused in the case, and there were no big revelations in his testimony to support the government’s allegation that Dougherty bribed Henon to take official action on Dougherty’s behalf.
Lazer has spent his entire career working in some capacity for Mayor Jim Kenney. His testimony covered a period in 2015 and 2016, after Kenney won the mayoral primary and up until his first several weeks in office.
He did acknowledge that for part of that time, he was paid as a consultant by the electricians union.
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Prosecutors played half a dozen wiretapped phone calls between Lazer and Dougherty and one between Lazer and Henon, most of which concerned the soda tax that Kenney was preparing to introduce in order to pay for universal pre-K and other initiatives. Lazer was seeking their support.
“We knew we needed labor support [to get it passed],” Lazer said. “So we asked Dougherty to help.” And they enlisted Henon, Lazer said, because he had just been elected majority leader in City Council.
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A few other calls involved an incident in which Dougherty’s car was getting towed and he called Lazer for help.
On cross-examination, Lazer explained that when Kenney was a councilmember and Lazer was his legislative aide, Kenney sponsored a bill to regulate rogue towing companies. The company that was towing Dougherty’s car, George Smith Towing, was violating those regulations.