WampaGate

Horsing around at Maushop Stables

Early in the twentieth century a wealthy New York City investment banker bought property on Cape Cod. One piece was a few acres on the shores of Prince Cove in Cotuit including an eighteen room Victorian "cottage" with a half-acre Japanese water garden but another was a large farm in Mashpee on the banks of the river that separates Mashpee from Cotuit. The farm was called Maushop and in addition to facilities for pigs, sheep, cattle and assorted fowl it had barns for horses. Inheritance, divisions and shifting lifestyles reduced the original farm to 29.1 acres still in family ownership when Jill Slaymaker, last of the Ackerman family to own Maushop ground sold out for $675,000 on September 29, 2000.

Slaymaker erected an indoor riding rink where she gave instruction and boarded horses in two barns on either side of the old country road that crossed the river from Cotuit into Mashpee. She believed she was selling the farm, which she had operated for years as a boarding stable and horse farm, complete with a resident manager in the old farmhouse, to the Mashpee Wampanog tribe. The lawyer who handled the transaction for both buyer and seller was Frederick C. Grosser. The name of the buyer was Maushop, LLC. The tribe placed a manager in charge of the farm's operations, rented barn space to horse owners and claimed to be intent on operating the Mashpee Wampanoag Riding Facility.

Grosser was quickly named manager of the farm and it was discovered that the actual purchaser of the farm was Herbert Strather. Strather is the Detroit real estate developer and gambling entrepreneur who claims to have injected, as he says invested, $15 million into the Mashpee Tribe to help it achieve full federal recognition as a sovereign Indian tribe. It was Glenn Marshall, pretend war hero and convicted rapist, who was controlling the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council at the time and it was Marshall who represented to Ackerman that it was the tribe who purchased the family farm from her.

Three interesting things followed the purchase: Strather mortgaged the farm for $682,000 (a quick profit of $7,500), the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council executed a ten year lease from Strather for $5,000 per month and on December 29, 2000 Herb Strather claimed to have assigned all "rights, title and interest" in the property to the tribe.  Strather even claimed to have done so publicly at the annual 'Wamp Ball'. But, in September of 2007 he still owned it, according to town records in Mashpee. (Stay tuned for an updated ownership report).

Now boarders of horses at the farm are being told they must remove their animals and leave the premises. The question now arises, what will happen to the property? At 29.1 acres it is .9 acres shy of requiring review by the Cape Cod Commission for a subdivision. 29.1 acres of farmland with mature trees and open fields on the banks of a tidal river adjacent to the Willow Bend development....and who really owns it and what benefit will the tribe receive from "their" purchase?

3 comments »

Wampanoag Member of Massachusetts Commission on Indian Affairs dies at age 60

Maurice Foxx of Mashpee, a well known member of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe known as Strong Bear died on Thursday of complications after heart surgery. Foxx had a history of heart issues. He was appointed to serve on the Massachusetts Commission on Indian Affairs and served as  chairman of the commission until 2007. At the time of his death Foxx was still a member of the commission.

When hundreds members the of tribe met at the Cotuit Sons of Italy Hall in August of last year to discuss the events surrounding the discovery that tribal council chairman Glenn Marshall had been convicted of rape in Barnstable twenty years prior and that he had lied about his military service record Foxx served as the meeting's moderator. After the meeting when Earl Cash Sr. read the statement written by Chief Vernon Lopez Foxx along with Ramona Peters stood with Cash and the chief before the assembled tribe members and press.

At the time of his death Foxx was divorced  He is survived by adult children. Further details about his death are not available at this time.

7 comments »

Friends Of Glenn = a dense FOG

   Even some Wampanoag Council members are in denial

   So what hope is there for the rest of the tribe without their Wamp Card?

"I don't think Glenn Marshall raped anyone. I mean, you how it is... people go to a party and they drink and things happen." "I don't think Glenn Marshall raped anyone. I mean, you how it is... people go to a party and they drink and things happen." The man who spoke these words to me recently is a very well-known member of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe. He is also well-known in political circles and now even has a job with the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council, complete with official business cards. There appears to be a new meteorological phenomenon in Mashpee, FOG. FOG stands for Friends of Glenn.

Perhaps the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs should issue two identification cards to Mashpee Wampanoags: the first would be the standard so-called Wamp card identifying the bearer as an enrolled member of the tribe recognized by the U.S. Government as an Indian and the second would be a FOG card identifying the bearer as a Mashpee Wampanoag who does not believe Glenn Marshall raped anyone or lied about his military record. The FOG card would also serve as a free pass to a mysterious new ATM. It is located at the FOG Bank.

Wamp Card holders having an easier time paying their bills

Members of FOG are now finding it easier to pay their bills because a number of them have found employment with the tribal council. One lucky winner is none other than Gayle Andrews. She is a Mashpee Wampanoag, now. But, a few years ago she renounced her Mashpee membership, as did her mother and other family members, and applied for and was granted admission to the rolls of the Aquinnah Wampanoag. When a year-long investigation determined that she had submitted false genealogical information, she was ousted by the Aquinnah and was eventually allowed back onto the Mashpee rolls. All is forgiven. FOG covers a lot of sins.

Gayle spent nearly two decades in television news reporting on Florida politics for the Tallahassee CBS affiliate. She left that career to become a Democrat political consultant and campaign public relations consultant and eventually left her business and debts behind to return to Mashpee, under cover of a heavy FOG. She was rumored to have been paid $6,000 per month to serve as a spokesperson for the tribe. Until her arrival the tribe's official spokesman had always been Scott Ferson, the white Democrat political hack from Boston who is paid by outside investors to tell the tribe what it thinks. The tribe cannot fire Ferson because they do not pay him. Now Andrews is frequently the source for press comments.

Andrews has a contract with the tribal council valued well into the six figures...A well-placed source within the tribe informs that Andrews has a contract with the tribal council valued well into the six figures. For this sum she is providing various services. One is the tribe's newsletter and another is a local television program she produces and organizes. Andrews also does... other things for the tribal council, presumably. She does general PR work and she, well, she does a lot of stuff.

Glenn may be "down", but he's hardly "out"

Not a few members of the tribe are curious about Glenn Marshall. His ouster as head of the tribal council cost him nearly $50,000 in annual earnings but he still maintains his standard of living: cars, motorcycle, trips, etc. Unemployment has not slowed him down. Perhaps his wife's beauty salon is a bigger earner than it appears to be. Some even wonder if Glenn has an arrangement with Gayle, perhaps some quiet consulting, but very hush - hush. Money does not grow on trees and Glenn was never much of a farmer anyway.

As far as money is concerned there are new questions emerging from the mist in Mashpee.

Two years ago, at the annual Wampanoag Ball, according to the FOG member who does not believe Glenn Marshall raped anyone, Herb Strather the self-described philanthropist and actual gambling speculator and real estate developer from Detroit announced to the tribe that he was forgiving their debt to him. Strather claimed to have injected as much as $15 million into the tribe to fund its drive for federal recognition. His claim to have forgiven the debt is at odds with what Scott Ferson told me in August of 2007. Ferson said that the new investor group led by Mssrs. Kirzner and Wolman had bought Strather's interest in the tribe's gambling plans.

How can that be? Strather and the tribe had signed an agreement by the terms of which they had become partners. If Kirzener and Wolman are now in possession of Strather's share of that agreement, Strather forgave nothing; he sold the tribe out. Strather, of course, is the first non-Indian member of FOG.

Here comes the really important question

   What is the source of all the money being spread around by the tribal council?
   Where is the tribal council getting the hundreds of thousands of dollars they are paying Gayle Andrews?Now comes a very important question; what is the source of all the money being spread around by the tribal council? Where is the tribal council getting the hundreds of thousands of dollars they are paying Gayle Andrews and where are they getting the money for all the new jobs they are handing out to card-carrying FOGGERS?

Since gaining federal recognition more than a year ago the tribe has delivered $250,000 to the town of Middleboro as the first payment of their scheduled payments to the town for their proposed gambling operations, and on and on. One member of the tribe has spoken of this mystery money as a "loan."

The theory is that the Mashpee Wampanoags are being loaned money by outside investors and that much of this money is being used to cultivate loyalty to the investors in the hearts of a select few, the FOGGERS. One has to wonder if this tribe is for sale or for lease. In February of 2009 there will be a tribal election that could see an entirely new group of Mashpee Wampanoags in control of the tribal council. Perhaps then the clouds will lift and the FOG will clear.

6 comments »

The empire has no clothes

Is There a Lesson in this for Massachusetts?
Are the Wampanoag & Mohegan tribes in over their heads?

By Peter Kenney

We in Massachusetts should perhaps keep an eye on what is happening with Connecticut's Mohegan tribe and its gambling empire.

At this time, the Mohegans have $1.2 billion outstanding in bonds -- debt that they have sold to the public as a way of raising capital for their expanding gambling operations. Yet the current issue of Forbes, as well as that ever-busy rumor mill are wondering if the Mohegans are in over their heads.

In fact, Moody's, the respected bond rating service, is hinting that if the Mohegans do not start generating some positive cash flow their bond rating will be lowered. Moody's is conducting a credit review and the tribe's $925 million loss is unsettling. Only one of the tribe's new ventures -- at Pocono Race Track in Pennsylvania -- is anywhere near producing income. This would mean the tribe will pay higher interest to its bond holders without seeing any compensating increase in income/profits. It could also mean that they will be unable to attract investors at all.

Dodgy doings in Dairyland

Staying away from criminals is one lesson we could all learn from the Mohegans. And, be careful about the contracts you sign. The Mohegans have signed an exclusive contract to manage a casino resort complex planned for Wisconsin. They have formed a partnership with the Menominee tribe in that state and the Menominees -- in partnership with a man named Dennis Troha -- have purchased the Dairyland Greyhound Park in Kenosha, Wisconsin. The former dog track is intended as the site for the new casino resort. But, Mr. Troha might not be available for opening day.

Far above the legal limit

Last week he pled guilty to some very nasty federal charges. It seems that Troha, through an arrangement whereby he funneled money through his family members, made contributions to politicians, one in particular, far in excess of legal limits. A $100,000 total contribution will get Uncle Sam's attention. Troha is due to be sentenced late this week. The whole Troha story, easily found all over the web, includes some very shady doings indeed.

A very expensive attitude

He made his fortune in the trucking business, where people often rub elbows with the wrong sorts of folks, even gangsters. While there are reports suggesting links between Troha and some underworld figures, his real difficulties seem to arise from allegations that he used improper and even illegal  tactics to avoid compliance with union regulations, that he paid lower-than-required wages and so on.

Troha is clearly not a man easily impeded by trifles such as laws. And this attitude could put him in federal prison for 25 years and cost him hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines.

Having decided not to go through a trial has Troha also decided to talk? It is reported that as many as three other individuals -- public officials  -- are on the block waiting for their own axes to fall. Presumably they were the recipients of, or couriers for, the Troha cash.

Whose mail are the checks in?

Imagine, this man was a partner of the Wisconsin Menominee. The Mohegans have saved the day by entering into a confidential contract to buy out Troha's interests in the Dairyland Greyhound Park project. But, the Mohegans themselves -- or at least some of their tribal council officers -- were also heavy contributors to Wisconsin politicians. No one from the Mohegans has been charged or implicated in wrongdoing.

This situation does, however, remind us of all those checks written by Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council officers and family to certain politicians in Washington who held positions from which they could help the Wampanoags.

Fewer coins to pop

Gambling used to be big business in this country. Now it is huge. Several things may combine to make the picture for large scale expansion of gambling/resort development in general, and tribal gambling enterprises in particular, less appealing now and in the future than in recent  times.

The soft economy, probably already in recession, will mean that there are fewer coins to pop into the slot machines and less disposable income generally. Then there is the issue of competition and market saturation -- how much gambling is too much? When will we reach that limit? Are we near it now? And, who is the competition for our own tribe, the Wampanoags of Mashpee?

Outfoxing the Mohegans

The Mohegans are involved in five gambling projects. Mohegan Sun is enormously profitable, but the tribe was the victim of very clever contract writing by their original partners, Len Wolman and Sol Kirzner. Wolman and Kirzner are the money men behind the Wampanoag gambling plans for Middleboro.

Not only did they outfox the Mohegans in their original deal, they are now receiving huge annual payments ($78 million last year) from the Mohegans to buy out their interests. Being aggressive businessmen Wolman and Kirzner are putting this new money to work backing the Wampanoag efforts, efforts, which if fruitful, will compete more or less directly with the Mohegans in Connecticut.

The Mohegans are also the tribal entity behind an effort to build a billion-dollar gambling and resort complex in Palmer, Massachusetts. Many in both the Indian and the gambling world seem to think that the Mohegans are rich enough from their own Mohegan Sun enterprise to finance and build this complex without either outside financing, or even federal protection from state regulations. They could simply compete with other applicants on an equal footing as private developers.

The big “what if”

What if Glenn Marshall -- the now deposed and disgraced former chairman of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribal council -- has already committed his tribe to the same type of contract with Wolman and Kirzner that allowed the two men to mine money from the Mohegan Sun development? Would the Wampanoags then be faced with a decision…to spend between half and all of a billion dollars to buy these men out?

Yes, a careful study of the history of the Mohegans in the gambling business could be very instructive for our Indian neighbors in Mashpee.

5 comments »

It helps with those mortgages -- but it stinks of conflict

The Mighty Firm of Ropes and Gray
Patricks have $324,000 mortgage - he makes $140,535, but she pays the price

By Peter Kenney

What happens when you WIN but take a cut in pay of as much as a couple of million dollars? Well, if your wife is a partner in a major Boston law firm, she remains with the firm and life goes on. You can even keep the big house in Milton and the new 10,000-square-foot weekender in the Berkshires while you serve as governor...of Massachusetts. This is precisely the situation in which Deval Patrick and his wife, Diane, found themselves when he was elected governor of Massachusetts. Diane Patrick is a partner in the firm of Ropes and Gray -- a rich, old, well-connected and powerful law firm.

$324K -- and that’s just to pay the mortgage

Prior to being elected governor, Deval Patrick had served as Vice President/Corporate Counsel/Corporate Secretary of the Coca Cola Corporation. He had held seats on the board of directors of both United Airlines and Ameriquest -- a well-known national predatory lender. While at Coca Cola, Patrick’s personal compensation package was substantial: in his first year $1.5 million; $2 million in his final year and a $2 million severance payment plus stock options, pension contributions and other benefits. Of course, carrying nearly $6 million in mortgages in 2006 with total monthly payments of $27,000, the Patricks could hardly be expected to live on the Massachusetts governor's salary of $140,535.00. At $27,000 per month, the Patricks need a yearly take of $324,000 just to pay their mortgages.

Firm connections.

So, how much is a full partner at one of the East Coast's premier law firms worth? No one knows other than a few people at the firm, other partners, the Patricks themselves and their lawyers and tax people. As did other candidates, Patrick refused to make his tax returns public. But, since his wife remains a partner at Ropes and Gray the public should perhaps be concerned that -- while he pushes ahead for legalization of casino gambling in Massachusetts -- his wife is a member of a very prosperous law firm that holds membership in the American Gaming Association. It is the only law firm in America that holds this membership.

Dan Kennedy (MEDIA NATION) offers an overview of three published pieces from the past year dealing with Ropes and Gray and their relationship to gambling interests. One is CapeCodToday’s reporting that the firm was believed to be providing counsel to Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council Chairman Shawn Hendricks and council member Desiree Hendricks. That was when they were called to testify before a federal grand jury looking into the management of council affairs by deposed council chairman Glenn Marshall. The second and third pieces come from the Boston Phoenix and the Boston Globe, respectively.

A leave of absence – it’s cleaner that way

What should we make of the Deval and Diane/Ropes and Gray connection to major gambling interests? Would it not be better for all concerned if this problem had never reared its ugly head? Why could Diane Patrick not have said, "Honey, I love the firm but it would be a lot cleaner if I take a leave of absence while you are bankrupting the state and take some little job as, oh, say a college president or the executive director at some non-profit agency. There must be a lot of those jobs around for a governor's wife...nothing big or splashy, just some little half-million-dollar-a-year gig until folks catch wise to you."

See, simple solution. She gets to pay the mortgages, he gets to keep his hands clean and Ropes and Gray will still do just fine. Not to make light of this situation; Diane Patrick is a lawyer with a strong resume and demonstrated marketable skills. She is also married to this state's chief executive, a man who is driving hard to establish vast gambling enterprises in Massachusetts.

It’s a gamble to stay with the firm

It is just plain dumb for her or her husband or even for Ropes and Gray to risk the appearance of conflict that this situation so clearly presents. If being married to then-Governor Bill Clinton was sufficient to get Hillary Clinton a seat on the board of directors of Wal-Mart, Diane Patrick can certainly find herself a "good job" somewhere far away from the gambling issue.

All partners in law firms share in the firm's profits. Ropes and Gray is a rich and highly profitable firm. Even though she may recuse herself from any decisions or even conversations about the firm's representation of gambling interests, strategies, fees and similar matters, she will still gain substantial monetary benefits from her husband's policies as governor because she is a member of the mighty firm of Ropes and Gray. It will help with those mortgages -- but it stinks of conflict.

9 comments »

Glenn Marshall…the New Judas?

If a man's word is no good, what about his contract?

Will Glenn Marshall's agreement with Mashpee town officials survive coming events? Was last Sunday's vote by the tribe an exercise in futility? Will Marshall's past misdeeds make the tribe's agreement unenforceable?

In the news again

Glenn Marshall's "contract" is about as good as his reputation.Glenn Marshall was busy in 2007 crafting an agreement between the town of Mashpee and his tribe, the Mashpee Wampanoags. As chairman of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council (MWTC), it was his responsibility to act in the tribe's behalf. Most who are familiar with Marshall's term of office -- which ended in disgrace in August of 2007 -- know that Marshall’s actions were guided more by the wishes of outsiders than by those of tribe members, even members of the tribal council. The tribe's white spokesman and white lawyer are both based in Boston and both have been paid by outside investors for approximately six years. Now Marshall's agreement with the town of Mashpee is important news again.

The town of Mashpee filed comments with the United States Bureau of Indian Affairs opposing the tribe's application to place hundreds of acres of land into federal trust. They did so because they claimed the tribe had not reached agreement with the town over two contentious issues. Actually, the desired agreement had been written, but not approved, by the tribe.

At a meeting of the tribe's members this past Sunday, approximately two-thirds of the two hundred Mashpee who attended voted to approve the agreement. If the Mashpee Board of Selectmen does likewise at an anticipated meeting later this week the agreement will be brought before a special town meeting for ratification. If all this goes according to Marshall's plan, the tribe will have surrendered its rights to pursue any further land claims against the town and will also have promised never to seek a gambling operation within the town.

Felony has found a home
Marshall was a prominent presence at Sunday's meeting. The four tribe members whose shunning he arranged last year attempted to gain entry but were turned away by individuals described as tribal security. Some have said that what the MWTC now calls security is actually a group of questionable individuals and perhaps even a felon. (We leave aside for the time being the question of who is paying the so-called security force.) But felony has found a home with at least one of the tribe's elite.

Glenn Marshall is, after all, a convicted violent felon for a rape he committed in Barnstable. He was sentenced to five years in prison but used his fabricated experiences in the Vietnam War to gain a judge's sympathy and a full release after only two months in jail. Marshall's past could become an issue if tribe members or outsiders decide to challenge the agreement that is apparently headed for acceptance by the town of Mashpee.

Red flags in the breeze
Consider: Glenn Marshall lied about his military record including how many combat tours he served in Vietnam, numerous wounds and what combat decorations he received. The truth, first reported in capecodtoday.com, is that he served a few months in a non-combat post and received not one award for valor or injury.

He even lied to Congress -- under oath -- about his glorious past and gave an entirely fictitious version of his life and times to a Barnstable High School student who recorded his recollections for inclusion in a veterans' archive organized by the Library of Congress. Add to this the fact that Marshall is known to have been the subject of a recent federal grand jury probe in Boston by the FBI and the IRS and red flags start waving in the breeze all over Mashpee.

What we know:
1.    Marshall is a violent man who has raped.
2.    Marshall is a liar who has gone so far as to lie to Congress and the world.
3.    Marshall's personal life style became instantly and visibly enriched when outside investors began pouring money into the tribe's recognition effort.
4.    Marshall crafted an unknown number of agreements on behalf of the tribe with the town of Mashpee and others; agreements never shown to the tribe's general membership, some perhaps not even to the MWTC.

What many wonder:
1.    What will be the outcome of the so-called federal investigations?
2.    If Marshall is found to have accepted money or other favors from outsiders as a price for his agreeing to their demands against the tribe's interests, are the agreements he made with those who paid and/or bribed him still valid?
3.    How can anyone take Glenn Marshall's word for anything?
4.    Are other members of the MWTC who served with Marshall likely to be included in any forthcoming federal charges? What did they know?

Should Mashpee and Middleboro be nervous? Does either town actually care about the potential for Marshall's methods to cancel their plans or are they more concerned about protecting land titles and a glitzy new casino complex?

A small price to pay
What will thirty pieces of silver buy in today's money? New boots, a house, a new truck, a motorcycle, some fast cars, a few vacations?

All that seems a small price to pay for the rights of an entire tribe, the heritage of an ancient and honorable people.

Cheap at twice the price.

9 comments »

Tallahassee Lassie

Will the real Gayle Andrews please stand up?

By Peter Kenney

Gayle Andrews is a mysterious presence at the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council offices. She is a tribe member and a paid employee of the council. But exactly what she does is unclear. A source, who wishes to remain anonymous, tells WampaGate that Gayle Andrews is not the sort of person one would want to do business with. Florida court records and even prominent black business people seem to agree.

Reporting from Tallahassee, this is Gayle Andrews,
From 1973 until 1989 she covered the Florida state capitol as a reporter for WCTV, the local CBS affiliate in Tallahassee. Gayle Andrews was someone to be reckoned with. Then she struck out on her and became a self-proclaimed media consultant for political figures and candidates. She did business, based in Tallahassee, as Andrews Plus. Perhaps she should have named her firm Andrews Minus, because she is deep in debt, at least in Florida. Her former office landlord is pursuing her for substantial back rents. Andrews also operated and then closed a restaurant named J. Drewsy's in the same building that housed her media firm.

Gayle Andrews, media consulting power
Between 2002 and 2006, democrats in Florida reportedly spent $27 million on media for their campaigns and Gayle Andrews was touting herself as catering to black candidates as a media consulting power. According to Charles Cherry, head of the Florida Black Owned Media Coalition (FBOMC), Andrews' firm spent only $23,000 with black-owned media during those same four years. He described her business with black-owned media as "crumbs" in a statement made to the media in the Tallahassee/Tampa Bay area on September 29, 2006 when he declared a boycott by FBOMC members. Coalition members thereafter returned checks from Andrews Plus and refused to do business with her or her firm. At the time, Andrews was a prominent presence in the campaign of Governor Jim Davis, whose campaign had one thing in common with Andrews ... neither returned calls from Florida media asking for comment on the FBOMC charges and boycott.

Gayle Andrews: Mashpee or Aquinnah?
While Andrews lived and worked in Florida she identified herself as black -- African American -- and she traded on that racial identity exclusively even though she was also a member of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe. At one point -- before the Mashpee had gained federal recognition -- Andrews and her mother applied for membership in the Aquinnah (Gay Head) Wampanoag tribe and were accepted. (See 12/04/07 WampaGate link at the bottom) Andrews surrendered her Mashpee membership. Suspicions arose within the Aquinnah Wampanoag tribe over the Andrews' historical material and genealogy submitted in support of their application. A year-long investigation resulted in their expulsion from the tribe.

Finally, the real Gayle
It was not long after the meltdown in Florida that Gayle Andrews rediscovered her true heritage and came home to Mashpee. During the Glenn Marshall regime as chairman of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribal council she was granted Mashpee membership again. It should be noted that her Mashpee credentials appear sound. She is a Peters. Ironically, the senior surviving member of the Peters family/clan, Amelia Bingham, Andrews' Aunt, has been shunned while Andrews has been -- not only readmitted -- but hired by the tribe and given what appears to be a position of influence in tribal affairs.

Whose default is it?
According to several tribe members, she found employment doing media and other undisclosed work for the tribe at $6,000 per month, enough to live comfortably in a rented house in Mashpee but not enough to pay her Florida debts. Court records posted by Leon County on the Web show judgments against Andrews totaling more than $16,000 and there is the lingering matter of the reported $50,000 she owes her former landlord, Tallahassee Highpoint Partners, in whose property Andrews had housed not only her office but her failed restaurant, J Drewsey's. One interesting aspect of the judgments against Andrews is that she appears to have defaulted, not shown up for the cases, on a routine basis.

Late last year Andrews was stripped of her lobbying credentials by the state of Florida due to her failure to pay a few hundred dollars as an annual registration fee. Andrews was quoted recently in Cape Cod media as saying that she simply did not pay the fee because she did not intend to return to Florida or to lobbying activities there. Fair enough. Is that the same reason she has not paid her Florida debts?

An image problem
Is her image the one the Mashpee Wampanoags want to portray to the world? In Florida she was black. Before Mashpee recognition she denounced her actual Mashpee heritage in favor of Aquinnah identity. Now she is again a Mashpee.

Will the real Gayle Andrews/Thornton/Marcellino/ Chamberlain please stand up? (More on the various last names Gayle Andrews has used in future pieces.)

And stand over there beside Deval Custer.
__________

Link to 12/4/07 column here. 

27 comments »

Ted Kennedy: champion or hack?

Influence and Agendas
RICO here, RICO there, pretty soon we're talking jail time

By Peter Kenney

As the saga of the Mashpee Wampanoag casino venture grinds slowly forward there is time to ponder some of the finer details of this story. One of these is the issue of how much help and support can the tribe expect from its elected representatives when tribe members bring up what they feel are irregularities in tribal management.

When will Ted Kennedy, the new American Moses leap into action?Normally, one would expect that as soon as he receives communications from, say, a tribal elder asking for a federal investigation of tribal finances and contracts, Ted Kennedy, the new American Moses, would leap into action. Some of the charges leveled by tribe members at former tribal council chairman Glenn Marshall are serious; charges such as misuse/diversion of grant monies, conflict of interest and fraudulent contracts. Certainly, the most-senior member of the United States Senate -- a man who lives on Cape Cod himself and who has long been an effective voice for fair dealings with minorities -- would take action.

The silence is deafening
But, while Kennedy comes down from the heights of Capitol Hill bearing tablets of the law and presidential campaign endorsements, he has been dead silent on matters concerning the Wampanoag situation. And, whatever influence he brought to bear among federal agencies seems to have been wasted. Outside "investors" continue their drive to reap huge profits from a gambling development in Middleboro that would have no chance at all of being built were it not for the use of Wampanoag federal sovereignty. While it is known that at least two federal agencies -- the IRS and the FBI -- were investigating Marshall and others last fall, nothing has happened to date. Nothing.

Is Hyannisport next?
Ted sees "conflict of interest" with  casinos but not with windmills.Could there be unseen hands at work in this situation? Kennedy recently told one tribe member, in response to a letter asking for help, that he could not become involved, that his ownership of property on Cape Cod poses a conflict of interest for him in view of the possibility that some of the Wampanoag descendants might attempt to reopen an earlier land suit. To date, the senator's neighborhood of Hyannisport has not been mentioned as a potential target for tribal interests, but one can never be too careful.

A question of influence
Perhaps we are looking in the wrong places for an answer to the question of why Kennedy has been so unwilling to help the members of the Wampanoag tribe deal with those who want to treat the tribe as their private piggy bank. Remember Scott Ferson? He’s the white man from Belmont -- paid directly by outside investors – who serves as spokesman for the tribal council. He also used to work for Senator Ted Kennedy … as his press secretary.

Perhaps the senior senator from Massachusetts has been more involved than we all thought. He is just not playing for the home team.One does not have to be a fingerprint expert to see what is going on here. Perhaps the senior senator from Massachusetts has been more involved than we all thought. He is just not playing for the home team. Would it not be wonderful to have someone in the press ask Ferson, "Have you ever spoken to the senator about anything concerning the Wampanoags?" Then, of course, we could ask the senator himself if Ferson has ever contacted him to discuss Wampanoag matters.

To be clear, I am not saying that this game has been in the bag from day one. And I am not saying that Ted Kennedy is just another long-winded veteran hack, doing favors for other hacks and special interests while claiming to champion the cause of the little guy. And, I am certainly not saying that Scott Ferson was hired by the tribe's exploiters/investors because of the backroom influence he can muster in their behalf.

Most of all, I want to avoid saying that Ferson is actively working in favor of those who want to exploit the tribe and against the actual tribe members for whom he claims to speak. It would be reckless of me to claim that Ferson had any part in the shunning of tribe members, the removal of others from the tribal rolls or the adding of new names and faces to the tribe's rolls. For me to do so would be unconscionable and perhaps defamatory...or, perhaps, true?

Sorry, the agenda is full
For some reason, whenever I think of Scott Ferson, Bill McDermott (the tribe's lawyer), Glenn Marshall, council chairman Shawn Hendricks and the investors -- Herb Strather, Sol Kirzner and Len Wolman -- the same little word comes to mind and I cannot understand why. That word is RICO.

For all his family glory and his Harvard education and his five decades in the senate, Ted Kennedy is still just another Boston Irish political hack. I guess helping the Wampanoags receive fair treatment does not fit into the good senator's Democrat agenda.

10 comments »

The Outsiders’ Way

Using Indian sovereignty for personal profit

By Peter Kenney

Following the best of their own ancient traditions, members of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe called for a meeting and then did business. More than one hundred strong, they met on their own tribal property and one after another spoke of the things that cause them concern. The main focus of the day was the shunning last year of members who had demanded access to the tribe's books. In the end, an impassioned chief Vernon 'Silent Drum" Lopez made it clear that -- by the ancient rules of tribal governance -- the shunning was not justified and should be revoked. More than one hundred voices voted agreement.

The profit motive

Now comes the problem. The tribe is still in the grips of a so-called tribal government under the rule of an elected tribal council who will not give in to the will of the membership or the chief. That council, although elected by the membership, is clearly controlled by outsiders whose only interest in Indian affairs is how to use Indian sovereignty to profit from gambling.

In the drive to build a casino in Middleboro under the auspices of the newly recognized sovereign Mashpee nation, these outsiders -- Len Wolman and Sol Kirzner -- even pay the white man from Boston who is identified as spokesman for the council. That man is Scott Ferson, president of the Liberty Square Group, former press spokesman for Sen. Ted Kennedy and formerly a senior campaign operative for various Massachusetts political figures.

The status quo – just do what you’re told

Ferson has had no comment on the latest efforts by tribe members to regain control of their own affairs. He clearly prefers the status quo -- council chairman Shawn Hendricks doing what he is told by the outside investors and running roughshod over tribal members. If I were a betting man, I would put my money on the tribe. Members are becoming increasingly uneasy about what they might find if they are ever allowed to examine the various agreements signed in their behalf by the former tribal council chairman, Glenn Marshall.

Something’s rotten in the council

Marshall was forced to resign in a firestorm of controversy after CapeCodToday.com published the first evidence of his sordid past. He had lied for years about his military record and had been convicted of rape. Then there was the matter of the federal investigation by the IRS and the Justice Department into his handling of tribal affairs, not to mention certain shadowy corporations he controlled along with Hendricks and others. Members of the tribe are deeply concerned about the extent to which this known liar may have sold out tribal interests to outsiders in return for personal enrichment. And they are concerned that his successor, Shawn Hendricks is no better.

Tribal elder Amelia Bingham, her son Stephen and two daughters remain shunned because the Hendricks tribal council will not relent. These four knew something was rotten at the council and suffered shunning as a reward for their attempts to find out how bad things actually were.

Glenn Marshall’s class act is in safe hands

Meanwhile, perched behind the wheel of his shiny black SUV, council chairman Hendricks drives around town holding up his middle finger in salute whenever he sees another tribe member who has spoken out against his rule.

The class act that was Glenn Marshall is clearly safe in the hands of Hendricks. Imagine, Glenn Marshall caused the tribe national publicity of the worst kind and he is still welcome anywhere on tribal property and at all tribal functions because that is the Indian way. But Amelia Bingham and the other shunned members cannot even vote in elections for their own tribal business. That is the Ferson-Wolman-Kirzner-McDermott-Hendricks way.

Questions for Scott Ferson

For some reason, members of the media are letting Scott Ferson off the hook. He has consistently declared himself the tribe's spokesman...what does he have to say now?

Since the right questions aren’t being asked elsewhere, CapeCodToday.com poses the following questions to Scott Ferson:

1.   Why will the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council not follow the words of the tribe's chief and revoke the shunnings?

2.   Do you have any knowledge of undue influence being exerted over tribal matters by any non-tribal members, including yourself?

3.   Who is exerting such influence other than yourself? Atty. Bill McDermott? Len Wolman and/or Sol Kirzner?

4.   Is it true that the tribe has been committed by contract to an arrangement with Kirzner and Wolman under which the tribe will not receive any share of income in the Middleboro casino complex other than from the actual gambling operations? This means that income from hotels, shops, boutiques, restaurants, parking concessions, health clubs, golf courses, nightclubs, etc....all non-gambling activities...will profit only non-tribal interests.

5.   Is it true that the tribe has been committed by contract to granting 40 percent of gambling profits to outsiders even though the Federal Indian Gaming Control Act stipulates that no more than 30 percent shall go to non-tribal interests? (Up to 40 percent under "extraordinary " circumstances) What are the "extraordinary circumstances" -- other then the greed of Wolman and Kirzner -- making the higher share justifiable?

6.   Is it true that those few members of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe who have seen draft agreements have been required to sign confidentiality agreements?

7.   Have you ever engaged in any actions designed to conceal any conduct by any person(s) or entities adverse to the interests of the members of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe?

8.   Are you aware of any actions by any person(s) or entities, which are or have been contrary to the interests of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe? If so, please identify both the action(s) and actor(s).

9.   What do you know of the tribal council’s secret purging of tribal rolls conducted to stifle opposition to the outsiders' seizing control of tribal affairs? What do you know of the claims heard in Mashpee that many new and unknown faces have apparently been allowed tribal enrollment?

10.  Are you now, or have you ever been, by your own words and/or deeds guilty of any dishonest or unlawful actions adverse to the interests of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe?

Of course, there is always that one last question that the ordinary political bottom-feeders find impossible to answer: Who do you think you are?

13 comments »

What Is a Tribe To Do?

The house always wins

By Peter Kenney

What is a tribe to do? This past week’s State House hearings on gambling in Massachusetts show all too clearly the dark side of casino gambling as it relates to Indian tribes. Historically the United States has first seized their lands, then destroyed their culture, and in a final act of disenfranchisement moved Indians from their native and natural places to far away so-called reservations. Now more than five hundred tribes of Indians native to the United State have been granted federal recognition. This recognition means that tribes become sovereign nations and it is as sovereign nations that the outside world, including states and the federal government, must deal with them.

The Federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act gives to recognized tribes the ability to operate gaming enterprises on tribal lands. For some tribes this has already become a source of incredible economic return. For many years after its completion more than two decades ago the casino at Foxwoods in Ledyard, Connecticut, was the largest single gambling floor in the world and the  annual gross income for tribal gaming in this country exceeds the combined totals of Las Vegas and Reno, Nevada. Tribal gaming is not big business -- it is immense.

Greed -- an equal-opportunity perverter
But with money comes a host of problems. Greed is an equal-opportunity perverter. It makes kind men cruel, quiet men loud and decent men dishonest. Those who have always been on the crafty side of ethical, when offered the opportunity to feast at the tribal crap tables, become positively ingenious at interpreting laws and rules to their own advantage. Two outstanding examples of this are Sol Kirzner and Len Wolman (on right eith brother), both originally from South Africa, both billionaires, both gaming and real estate developers/operators and both now firmly in control of one of the two federally recognized tribes located in Massachusetts, the Mashpee Wampanoags. Kirzner is identified by reliable sources as a net billionaire. Can Wolman be far behind?

The Yaqui way
A few years ago an MIT-educated Yaqui Indian named Floyd Gallegos (on right), who works to help tribes across the nation by gaining for them grants and other help, introduced a real estate developer from Detroit, Herbert Strather, to the Mashpee Wampanoags. Gallegos is a longtime friend of another MIT-educated Indian, Jim Peters. Peters is Commissioner of Indian Affairs in Massachusetts. Strather began pouring cash into the tribe to fund its drive for federal recognition. When the recognition was achieved it became clear that Strather had a long-standing contract with the tribe to be its gaming partner. Strather has stated publicly that he is a philanthropist; that he injected $15 million into the Mashpee effort.

As a commenter writes below. "as long as Shawn Hendricks is the Chairman, Marshall is still running the show."The Marshall deals
All the while that Strather was involved with the tribe, rumblings were heard about dissatisfaction among tribe members about how the Strather faction conducted tribal business. Strather paid the tribe’s lawyers, lobbyists and public spokesman directly, and clearly controlled the actions of the tribal council, led by Glenn Marshall. It surprised few in the tribe when CapeCodToday.com first broke the news that Marshall had a criminal record and had lied about his military service. By the end of that week, local and even national press had picked up the story and Marshall was forced out of office. It was the felon Marshall who had made whatever deals Strather had with the tribe.

Kirzner from the beginning?
Now the Massachusetts legislature wants to know about the details of the agreements that the Kirzner/Wolman group had in Connecticut with the Mohegans. Strather has declared that he has sold his interest in the Mashpee gaming agreements to Kirzner so now Massachusetts may have to deal with this hard-driving opportunist. In fact, I am far from alone in believing that Kirzner was the true power and money behind the Mashpee effort from the beginning. At the time when Strather claimed to be pumping millions into the tribe, commercial and residential properties he had developed in the Detroit area were being foreclosed. Something just did not ring true.

Extraordinary conditions
Kirzner's maneuverings in his dealings with the Mohegan tribe at the Mohegan Sun Resort are a textbook example of what tribes should try to avoid. Under the terms of the Federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act at least two things are expected to be done differently from what happened in Connecticut:

1. The tribe will receive a share of the profits from every dollar spent on its land associated with the gaming enterprise.

2. The tribe's investors may receive no more than 30 percent of the net profits.

Kirzner found loophole after loophole in these clear conditions at Mohegan Sun. First he exercised the “extraordinary conditions” clause in the Act and raised his take from 30 to 40 percent. It is known that this is what the Mashpee have already agreed to in their contract with him. Then, and more significantly, he excluded from the tribe’s part of the deal everything except the actual income from the casino and its gambling operations. This means that the tribe does not share in the profits from parking lots, stores and boutiques, restaurants, health clubs, golf courses and so on. Not only did Kirzner out-lawyer the Mohegans, he has already achieved similar victories over the Mashpee.

Killed bill
Furthermore, as if winning lopsided deals from the individual tribes is not enough, Kirzner even sabotaged U.S. congressional efforts to tighten the terms of the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act. Arizona senator John McCain introduced legislation that would reinforce tribal rights with investors but his bill was defeated last year and Kirzner was prominent among those paying the freight for the lobbying effort that killed the new bill. How ironic it is that Kirzner used money he gained from exploitive deals with a tribe to defeat a law that would protect tribes from...Sol Kirzner.

Adelson says it’s wrong
Kirzner also changed his designation from “manager,” under which term he would have had only a five-year ride with the tribe, to “consultant.” This allows him to receive 10 percent of the Mohegan Sun gaming profits every year until 2014. Last year he was paid $68 million under this arrangement. Estimates are that his total profit from Mohegan Sun will exceed $1 billion. Another major figure in the gambling world is Massachusetts native son Sheldon Adelson, now ranked as the third-richest man in the United States. Adelson owns the Sands and the Venetian in Las Vegas and has vast gaming and resort interests in Asia and elsewhere. Asked by legislators last week what he thought of the Kirzner deals in Connecticut Adelson said they were wrong and that they should not have happened. Adelson appeared at last week’s hearings because he has declared an interest in competing for a casino gaming license under Governor Deval Patrick’s proposed gaming legislation.

We should never lose sight of a few simple facts when we look at and think about the Mashpee casino situation:

1. Outside interests are clearly in control of tribal governance.

2. The Mashpee Wampanoags never posted a Request for Proposals to make potential partners compete for their casino profits.

3. The people who have agreements binding the Mashpee to them have taken at least one other tribe to the cleaners already and actively opposed efforts to make federal law more protective of Indian interests.

Kirzner said he wouldn’t but…
One last fact should remain in view when pondering the charming Sol Kirzner. In negotiations with officials in Rhode Island to obtain certain gaming privileges there, Kirzner gave his personal assurance that he would not interfere in any political process affecting other gaming issues in Rhode Island. Sol Kirzner personally told the governor of Rhode Island he would not interfere in the politics of gambling in Rhode Island. Last year he paid millions of dollars into lobbying efforts to kill a bill that would have legalized slot machine competition in Rhode Island. If he places so little value on his own word, how much value should anyone else place on his contract?

It would appear that Kirzner is walking proof of the old adage, "The house always wins."

18 comments »