PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — The defense rested its case on Monday in the bribery trial of Philadelphia City Councilmember Kenyatta Johnson, his wife and two former executives of Universal Companies, after less than two days of testimony.
Closing arguments are expected to begin on Tuesday. The case next goes to the jury.
Prosecutors spent two weeks laying out their case, put on 20 witnesses and introduced hundreds of documents in the case. The defense, though, took less than a day and a half, calling just seven witnesses.
The attorney for Johnson’s wife, Dawn Chavous, made the most extensive defense, presenting five witnesses who testified about specific work that Johnson’s wife Dawn Chavous had done under her 16-month contract with Universal, a Kenny Gamble-founded charter school and affordable housing non-profit in Johnson’s district.
Prosecutors allege that contract was actually a bribe to Johnson. The defense tried to dismantle the bribery allegation by establishing that Chavous fulfilled the terms of the $67,000 contract. Testimony that Chavous made calls, held meetings, sent emails and planned events for Universal was important to the defense of all four defendants.
The defense called two high-profile Philadelphians — Jeff Brown of Shop Rite and philanthropist Richard Binswanger — to testify about Chavous’ lobbying them on behalf of Universal. Chavous’ attorney also called a former Universal employee who said Chavous was a hard worker and he was “overwhelmingly” satisfied with her performance.
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In 2014, Councilman Johnson took two routine actions that benefitted Universal: sponsoring a zoning change for the Royal Theater, which Universal owned, and telling the Redevelopment Authority, when asked, that he did not want it to retake possession of lots Universal owned jointly with the Philadelphia Housing Authority.
Prosecutors alleged Johnson’s motivation was not his long-time support of the company or the preference of his constituents, but rather Chavous’ contract with the company over the 16 months from 2013 until two months before Johnson sponsored the rezoning.
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But the former project manager for co-developer Carl Dranoff and a lobbyist the firm hired testified to the extensive measures they took to get the zoning introduced and approved in council, suggesting it would have been unnecessary if Johnson were being bribed.
Johnson’s attorney called one witness to testify about the extensive outreach done to get community approval of the rezoning. And the attorney for former Universal CEO Rahim Islam called one witness who testified to lobbying Johnson on the project. Former Universal CFO Shahied Dawan, who was barely mentioned in the case, didn’t put on any witnesses.
Defense attorneys had listed dozens of potential character witnesses before the trial started, but not a single one was called.