Alaska Employment Law

Judge John Sedwick has published two more opinions in U S. v. Kott & Weyhrauch, 3:07-cr-00056 JWS (D.Alaska).   

In the more recent opinion, Judge Sedwick held that AS 24.60.030(3) does not require a legislator to disclose negotiations for employment.  Other portions of AS 24.60 (”Standards of Conduct”) expressly require disclosure of various legislator actions.  Thus, the absence of such a requirement in the section dealing with employment negotiations leads to the conclusion that disclosure is unnecessary.  Moreover, because the statutory scheme expressly supersedes common law, the United States cannot rely on inherent fiduciary duty to show breach of a duty to disclose.  Thus, “neither Weyhrauch nor Kott was subject to a duty created by State law to disclose his dealings with VECO and its executives.”  U. S. v. Kott & Weyhrauch, 2007 WL 2572355 (D.Alaska Sept. 4, 2007).

Earlier, Judge Sedwick narrowed a previous ruling and held that that the crime of “honest services mail fraud” permits Weyhrauch to introduce evidence of his long-standing commitments to build a gas pipeline and to support certain tax policies, so long as Weyhrauch “also presents admissible evidence that [VECO executives Bill Allen and/or Rick Smith] had been informed of such positions and that Weyhrauch, in turn, knew that Allen and/or Smith had been so informed.”   U. S. v. Kott & Weyhrauch, 2007 WL 2493480 (D.Alaska Aug. 29, 2007).