Rhode Island Track Execs Arraigned

[Louis Cypher]

The Pawtucket Times

Tim Grace 09/18/2003


PROVIDENCE -- A trial that could rewrite the future of the state’s gambling industry will begin Friday morning in the federal courthouse on Kennedy Plaza.

Two top executives with Lincoln Park, the state’s largest gambling facility, are to be arraigned on a combined total of 22 conspiracy and wire fraud charges.

Lincoln Park CEO Daniel Bucci and Nigel Potter, CEO of Lincoln Park’s London-based parent company Wembley plc are alleged to have cooked up a scheme to shell out as much as $4.5 million in bribes to McKinnon & Harwood, the law firm of then-House Speaker John Harwood.

According to the indictment, the bribes, couched as "incentives" or "bonuses," were supposed to secure state approval for installation of more than 1,000 additional video slot machines and introduction of the more profitable "coin-drop" slot machines at Lincoln Park.

Another stated goal was to ensure that the Narragansett Indian Tribe’s bid to build a full-service casino would be squashed by elected officials, according to the indictment.

Bucci, Potter and Claes Hultman, chairman of Wembley’s board of directors, have denied the charges. Neither Harwood nor his law partner Daniel McKinnon have been accused of any wrongdoing.

Both Hultman and Potter have said the timeline included in the indictment leaves out details that, once revealed, will clear up any perception of illegality.

Bucci, Potter and a representative from the Lincoln Park corporation are to appear before Magistrate Judge David Martin at 11:30 a.m.

Action in the courtroom will likely be limited to presentation of the charges, pleas of guilty or not guilty from the defendants, and consideration of bail.

Potter, who makes his home in London, is slated to enter the country to face the charges. His attorney, C. Leonard O’Brien, did not immediately return a call placed to his Providence office Wednesday afternoon.

Though the trial is in its earliest stages, its impact is already being felt politically.

Gov. Donald Carcieri has said talks of a long-term agreement for the division of gambling profits between Lincoln Park and the state were de-railed by last week’s indictments.

"Everything is on hold at the moment until we see what is going on," Carcieri told The Times.

Carcieri plans to meet with Hultman next week to discuss Lincoln Park’s future. The track had announced plans to pump $40 million into expansion of their facility.

Senate President William Irons said last week that "the circumstances are that the facilities need more machines and the state needs the revenue from those additional machines.

"If the charges are found to be true -- and I say ‘if’ most emphatically -- then there is no question that this vendor would be taken out and a new owner would be put in place."

Having run out of space in their main building, expansion into the long-abandoned "Clubhouse" would be a prerequisite for the addition of more video slot machines.

In January, the track received approval from the state’s Lottery Commission to add 1,300 additional machines to the roughly 1,700 already in place. Space constraints have kept about 700 of those machines on the shelf and forced others into low-traffic areas at the track, according to Lincoln Park officials.

But speaking to a reporter the day before his indictment, Bucci said Wembley officials were unlikely to invest in expansion without a long-term profit-sharing agreement with the state.

"We’ve poured millions into infrastructure over the last 10 years," Bucci said. "I think, by nature of the fact that we’re retrofitting a 65-year-old building designed for pari-mutuels, were constrained.

"But no one would put out that kind of an investment without knowing what their revenue stream is going to be."

The state currently takes 54 percent of revenues generated by Lincoln Park. Wembley is left with 27.5 percent.

Bucci estimated installation of the machines would put another $10 million per month into the state’s coffers.

"The faster the new building can be constructed, the better for the state," he said.