PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Shop Rite CEO Jeff Brown took the witness stand in federal court Thursday as the defense began its case in the bribery trial of Philadelphia City Councilman Kenyatta Johnson, his wife Dawn Chavous, and two former executives of the Universal Companies.
Brown’s testimony was intended to rebut the allegation that Chavous had done little work for a consulting contract she had with Universal because the contract was simply a ruse for a bribe to Johnson, in exchange for the councilman’s help with real estate that Universal owned in his district.
According to Brown, Chavous was instrumental in securing his partnership with Universal’s Academy program, a modern-day vocational school, at Audenreid High School in South Philadelphia.
“From my observation, (Chavous) had impeccable follow-up skills,” Brown said. “She worked hard in my interactions with her.”
Brown said that he had met Universal’s founder, music producer Kenny Gamble, at various functions. He added that they had discussed a potential partnership, but nothing had come of the discussions until Chavous reached out, and arranged a meeting and an eventual tour of Audenried.
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After that, Brown said, the Shop Rite near the school provided food for Audenried’s Culinary Arts program and a pipeline to jobs for graduates.
Brown described it as a mutually beneficial arrangement, one that helped Shop Rite “to get the right kind of young people into our industry” without the expense of training on the gamble that they will stick with the profession.
For Universal, he said, their graduates “were almost guaranteed a job.”
He said the meeting with Universal had also helped Shop Rite refine its annual Thanksgiving turkey giveaway by offering a certificate to families in Universal charter schools, as opposed to its previous model of “lugging turkeys around.”
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“If they come to the store (to redeem the certificate), maybe they would buy other things for the holiday table,” he said.
Two more witnesses offered similar appraisals of Chavous’ work.
Philanthropist Richard Binswanger said he was one of the first board members of the Philadelphia School Partnership, a major donor to school choice causes in the city, and that Chavous had lobbied him on behalf of Universal.
Universal had previously received a grant from the donor group, he said, but that was no guarantee of further funding because grants were awarded on a project basis.
Related Jawncast: An in-depth analysis of the Kenyatta Johnson trial and how it came to this point.
Former Universal employee Greg Scott said Chavous had opened doors that had previously been closed to Universal.
“We didn’t have a donor network,” he said. “Other charters used donors (to get extra funding). We didn’t have that.”
Chavous, he said, was hired to do government affairs, fundraising, and “facilitating relationships with people we didn’t know… high profile donors she was already working with.”
Her value, Scott said, was that. “She was in that world," Scott explained.
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According to Scott, that group of donors included the Yass family — billionaire co-founders of the Susquehanna Group-- who donated large sums to charter schools. He also cited her connections to PSP.
“She was the right person,” Scott said, confirming that he was “overwhelmingly” satisfied with her performance.
Scott’s direct testimony lasted less than an hour, but the often-tense cross-examination lasted more than twice as long as Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric Gibson entered dozens more documents, in addition to the hundreds the government had already admitted, in an attempt to undermine Scott’s testimony.
The documents included emails between Janine Yass and Universal CEO Rahim Islam, a co-defendant for his alleged role in the bribery scheme, the year before Chavous began working for Universal in 2013.
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Those documents showed that Mrs. Yass had made a large donation that year. They also showed PSP had given money to Universal charter schools prior to Chavous’ involvement.
But the tension between Gibson and Scott seemed almost personal. Gibson asked what role Scott had played at Universal and if it wasn’t as a “bodyman” to Islam (a term of art to describe a personal assistant) that could provide a stick of gum if Islam needed it.
“I wasn’t the really the gum man,” Scott joked, adding, “I might give him an Altoid.”
Gibson was not amused. He called up Scott’s grand jury testimony, where Scott had described the duties of a bodyman as providing everything from documents to gum.
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“Who brought up gum in the grand jury?” Gibson demanded, as Scott explained he was speaking in general, not his specific duties to Islam.
“Maybe I gave (Islam) gum,” Scott demurred.
Later on, Gibson asked if Scott had not refused to meet with prosecutors prior to his testimony for the defense. Scott, who has been a district magistrate in Montgomery County until recently resigning to run for the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, responded that he had met voluntarily with prosecutors before, then testified before the grand jury.
Then, he said FBI agent Richard Haag had “showed up in my courtroom,” though he knew Scott had engaged an attorney in the matter. He said after that, he chose not to engage with prosecutors.
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