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Trial for Ex-Wampanoag Tribe Chair Cromwell Underway
BOSTON (AP) – A former chairperson of the Massachusetts tribe whose ancestors aided the Pilgrims is going on federal trial.
The trial got underway at U.S. District Court in Boston on Tuesday after being delayed for months by the coronavirus pandemic.
Cromwell is being tried along with co-defendant David DeQuattro, who is the owner of an architecture firm in Providence, Rhode Island. DeQuattro also denies the charges.
Federal prosecutors say Cromwell engaged in a conspiracy to commit bribery with DeQuattro.
From The Associated Press
Bribery trial to begin for former head of Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe
In the spring of 2017, the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe was pushing forward with plans to build a $1 billion casino in Taunton when Cedric Cromwell, the tribe’s chairman, texted an architect overseeing the project, asking him to pay for a three-night stay at an upscale Boston hotel for Cromwell’s upcoming birthday weekend, according to federal prosecutors.
“Is it possible that you can get me a nice hotel room at the Four Seasons or a suite at the Seaport Hotel?” Cromwell wrote David DeQuattro, director of a Rhode Island architectural firm that had a lucrative contract with the tribe. “I’m going to have a special guest with me. Please let me know and Thank You.”
DeQuattro, who had allegedly already given Cromwell more than $50,000, as well as home exercise equipment, forwarded the text to his boss, along with the message, “u can’t think of this stuff . . . what is next?”
With his boss’s blessing, DeQuattro booked Cromwell an executive king suite with a harbor view at the Seaport Hotel, and used his company credit card to pay $1,800, covering all but about $600 of the bill, prosecutors allege.
This week, Cromwell, who was removed as Mashpee Wampanoag chairman after his November 2020 indictment, and DeQuattro head to trial in US District Court in Boston, where a jury will be asked to decide whether that extravagant birthday gift and other payments were bribes offered in exchange for “favorable action or inaction” by Cromwell related to the tribe’s contract with DeQuattro’s company, or merely gratuities that came with no strings attached, making them perfectly legal.
Cromwell, 56, who lives in Attleboro, is charged with conspiracy to commit extortion, four counts of extortion, conspiracy to commit bribery, and two counts of bribery. DeQuattro, 56, of Warwick, R.I., is charged with conspiracy to commit bribery and two counts of bribery. Cromwell faces additional charges of filing false tax returns, which were severed from the case by the trial judge and will be tried later.
Prosecutors allege that Cromwell extorted $54,000 in cash, and benefits worth an additional $3,500, from Robinson Green Beretta Corp., also known as RGB Architects, through DeQuattro between 2014 and 2017. At the time, Cromwell was also serving as president of the tribe’s five-member gaming authority, which paid the company nearly $5 million under a consulting contract that could be terminated for cause with seven days’ notice or for convenience with a month’s notice.
The indictment alleges the payments were in exchange for “favorable action or inaction” on the contract by the Mashpee Wampanoag’s gaming authority.
With jury selection beginning Tuesday, lawyers for Cromwell and DeQuattro declined to comment on the case, but have argued in court that there is no evidence that the payments were a quid pro quo — bribes in exchange for some official action, or inaction, by Cromwell.
“The government says that Mr. DeQuattro feared that but for the payment the contract would be ‘at risk,’ ” Martin Weinberg, an attorney who represents DeQuattro, argued in court last year while trying to get the case dismissed. “Conspiracy agreements do not get proven and cannot rest alone on one defendant’s subjective fear.”
He argued there was no evidence that Cromwell ever did or said anything to make DeQuattro concerned about the fate of the contract. DeQuattro made the payments “in good faith” as donations Cromwell requested for his reelection campaign for chairman and for tribal charities, Weinberg said.
Cromwell’s lawyer, Timothy R. Flaherty, argued in court filings that Cromwell “did no more than cosign (or on one occasion sign) checks” from the tribe to DeQuattro’s company for its work on the casino project.
But prosecutors have said they will present evidence that Cromwell extorted the payments from the company with the understanding that he would use his influence to make sure the tribe’s gaming authority didn’t terminate its contract.
“When given in exchange for payment, an official’s promise to make something not happen is just as criminal as a promise to make something happen,” Assistant US Attorney Christine Wichers argued during a pretrial hearing.
Prosecutors wrote in court filings that DeQuattro “is not alleged to have been a close friend or family member, or even a Tribe constituent, but a businessman with a vested interest in preserving the contract.”
The first $10,000 check was made payable to Cromwell’s shell company, One Nation Development. Cromwell said his political action committee would use the money for food, campaigns, and elections, but instead it went toward “personal expenses, including payments to his mistress,” prosecutors allege.
Prosecutors say DeQuattro and Joseph R. Beretta, then the company’s president and majority shareholder, conspired to conceal the bribes by having DeQuattro use his personal bank account to send four $10,000 checks and a $4,000 check to Cromwell, funneling the money through Cromwell’s shell company and a company belonging to one of Cromwell’s friends. DeQuattro was later reimbursed by the company with payments disguised as bonuses or one-time salary increases, prosecutors allege.
Beretta is not named in the indictment but was identified in court as an unindicted co-conspirator who has been granted immunity in exchange for his cooperation and is expected to testify for the government. He retired from the company in 2019.
Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe Chairman Brian Weeden, who was elected to the post last year, said in a statement that Cromwell’s trial, regardless of the outcome, “will represent an unfortunate chapter for our tribe and detract from the great work we are doing socially, culturally, and politically to support our people. Tribal members are of course disappointed and anxious to see what evidence will be brought forward as a matter of due process to substantiate charges of bribery, extortion, and tax evasion against Mr. Cromwell.”
The tribe began construction of the First Light Resort & Casino on reservation land in Taunton in 2016, a year after the Obama administration agreed to hold 321 acres in Mashpee and Taunton in trust for the tribe. But the project was halted that year when a federal judge ruled in favor of a group of Taunton property owners who argued that the federal government lacked the authority to designate the land as a sovereign reservation.
The tribe, which has about 2,600 enrolled citizens, was dealt another blow in 2020 when the US Interior Department, under the Trump administration, ordered the land taken out of trust. In December, the department rescinded that order, restoring the tribe’s control of the land. While that ruling renewed the possibility for a casino on the site, it’s unclear whether that will happen.
On Monday, Steven Peters, a spokesman for the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe, said, “Our tribe is exploring its options to do what’s best on our land. A lot has changed since we originally broke ground on our casino in Taunton, including COVID. So our tribe wants to make sure whatever we do for economic development is in the best interest of our tribe and in the best interest of Southeastern Massachusetts.”
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