PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AFX) - An ethics panel on Tuesday declined to launch a full-scale investigation into the state attorney general's acceptance of campaign money from a lawyer for DuPont Co. when he was negotiating to drop the company from a lawsuit potentially worth billions of dollars.
Attorney General Patrick Lynch, a Democrat, has said he did nothing wrong and that the complaint filed by his challenger in the November election was politically motivated.
The Rhode Island Ethics Commission dismissed the complaint after a commission prosecutor said Lynch's acceptance of a $500 contribution 'gives rise to an appearance of impropriety, if not evidence of poor judgment,' but said that alone did not constitute an ethics code violation.
The prosecutor's report also found no evidence the contribution was made in exchange for DuPont being dropped from the lawsuit.
The complaint, alleging conflict of interest and influence peddling, was filed by Bill Harsch, a Republican.
'I am frankly shocked and very disappointed that the Ethics Commission didn't have the courage to step up to the line and take on the attorney general,' Harsch told reporters.
Patrick Lynch's campaign manager, Andrew Roos, said he was happy with the decision but would not comment in detail.
Ethics commission members had a 'heated discussion' about the complaint before deciding -- by a 5-1 vote -- that it didn't merit further investigation, said commission Chairman James Lynch, who is not related to the attorney general.
The lawsuit alleged that former makers of lead-based paint created a public nuisance by manufacturing and selling toxic products.
The negotiations on behalf of DuPont led to a deal in which the company agreed to pay about $12.5 million to charity and was allowed out of the lawsuit.
A jury decided in February that three of the remaining companies were liable. A judge has not yet decided how much, if anything, the companies must pay, but the state has said cleaning up lead paint contamination will cost billions.
Patrick Lynch said in a statement Tuesday that the deal with DuPont was a 'historic jump-start' toward cleaning up the contamination.
The deal with DuPont was announced in June 2005, but Lynch had been in talks with the company for more than a year before that, and his office's primary contact was Bernard Nash, a lawyer hired by DuPont.
Nash gave $500 to Lynch's campaign committee in June 2004, while the negotiations were underway. He and his wife contributed an additional $2,000 less than six months after the agreement was announced.
According to campaign records, Lynch also accepted donations from at least two other people with business ties to DuPont, including Olivia Morgan. He is employed by the Dewey Square Group, a consultant for DuPont, and gave Lynch's campaign $250 last December. Morgan is also executive director of the Children's Health Forum, the charity started by DuPont that stands to receive $9 million from DuPont's deal with the state.
DuPont's link to the charity was not publicly revealed until The Associated Press reported on it earlier this month.
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© 2006 AFX News
