![\"Democratic](\"https:\/\/news2.watchtowatch.top\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Screenshot_535-1759311583-q80.webp\")
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The corruption investigation that has ensnared Los Angeles City Councilman Curren Price represents one of the most complex and financially significant cases of municipal fraud in recent California history. The Los Angeles District Attorney\u2019s office filed two additional charges against the Democratic councilman this week, bringing the total scope of alleged criminal activity to over $800,000 in misappropriated public funds and questionable financial arrangements.<\/p>\n
Price, who has served as the Los Angeles City Councilmember for the Ninth District since 2013, now faces an expanded criminal case that prosecutors describe as a systematic abuse of public office for personal financial gain spanning multiple years and involving numerous city agencies and contractors.<\/p>\n
\u201cEmbezzling public funds and awarding contracts for your own financial gain is the antithesis of public service,\u201d Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman declared in announcing the additional charges. \u201cOur communities expect and deserve better from their public officials.\u201d<\/p>\n
The district attorney\u2019s strong language reflects the severity of the allegations and the broader implications for public trust in municipal government. Hochman continued: \u201cI thank our investigative team and prosecutors in the Public Integrity Division for diligently pursuing every lead and holding elected officials accountable. Self-dealing and pay-to-play politics will not be tolerated in Los Angeles County.\u201d<\/p>\n
This commitment to accountability comes as prosecutors have uncovered what they describe as a sophisticated scheme involving multiple agencies, fake relationships, and systematic conflicts of interest that allegedly enriched Price and his associates at taxpayer expense.<\/p>\n
The most financially significant aspect of the corruption case involves allegations that Price orchestrated a complex scheme whereby city agencies paid his wife\u2019s company more than $800,000 while he simultaneously voted to award those same agencies multimillion-dollar contracts\u2014a clear violation of conflict-of-interest laws and ethical standards.<\/p>\n
According to prosecutors, the Los Angeles County Housing Authority and LA Metro paid Price\u2019s wife, Delbra Pettice Richardson, through her company Del Richardson & Associates, more than $800,000 total at the same time Price was voting to approve massive funding allocations for these agencies.<\/p>\n
The Housing Authority component of the scheme was particularly brazen. Between October 22, 2019, and June 30, 2020, the Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles allegedly paid Del Richardson & Associates approximately $609,600. During that exact same period, Curren Price voted to approve a $35 million federal grant and supported a $252 million state grant application for the agency.<\/p>\n
The timing and amounts involved suggest a coordinated effort to extract maximum financial benefit from Price\u2019s official position while he was simultaneously making decisions that would benefit the agencies providing payments to his wife\u2019s company. The fact that his staff had flagged the potential conflict of interest beforehand indicates that Price was aware of the ethical violations but chose to proceed anyway.<\/p>\n
The LA Metro component of the scheme followed a similar pattern. From October 27, 2020, to October 20, 2021, LA Metro reportedly paid Del Richardson & Associates approximately $219,500. During that same timeframe, Price introduced and voted in favor of a motion to allocate $30 million to LA Metro, despite his staff having again flagged the conflict prior to the votes.<\/p>\n
These allegations reveal a systematic pattern where Price\u2019s official votes and advocacy directly benefited agencies that were simultaneously paying substantial sums to his wife\u2019s business, creating what prosecutors characterize as a clear pay-to-play arrangement that enriched the councilman\u2019s household while violating his fiduciary duties to taxpayers.<\/p>\n
Beyond the contract steering allegations, Price faces charges related to an even more personally damaging scheme involving healthcare fraud based on a fake marriage claim that allowed him to embezzle city funds for personal medical benefits.<\/p>\n
Price is accused of embezzling approximately $33,800 in city funds from 2013-2017 to pay for medical benefits for Richardson, whom he falsely claimed was his wife while still being legally married to Lynn Suzette Price. This deception allowed him to obtain spousal healthcare benefits for Richardson at taxpayer expense while maintaining his actual marriage to another woman.<\/p>\n
This aspect of the case reveals not only financial fraud but personal dishonesty that undermines Price\u2019s credibility and demonstrates a willingness to lie about fundamental personal relationships to obtain financial benefits. The multi-year duration of this fraud suggests systematic planning and ongoing deception rather than a momentary lapse in judgment.<\/p>\n
The story that Washington\u2019s power players prayed would never resurface has just detonated like a political earthquake.<\/p>\n
After years of whispers, cover-ups, and finger-pointing, the Department of Justice has finally unsealed its long-awaited\u00a0<\/p>\n
indictment against former FBI Director James Comey<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 and the revelations inside are every bit as explosive as insiders feared.<\/p>\n But as journalists and political operatives scrambled to digest the charges, two mysterious figures buried in the indictment stood out. They were not named directly but referred to in sterile legal code as\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cPERSON 1\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0\u201cPERSON 3.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n At first glance, those designations might have seemed meaningless \u2014 placeholders in a lengthy court filing. But within hours, new leaks and confirmations turned those two words into political dynamite.<\/p>\n Because\u00a0\u201cPERSON 1\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0has now been confirmed as\u00a0Hillary Clinton<\/strong>, and\u00a0\u201cPERSON 3\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0as Comey\u2019s longtime confidant and sometimes personal attorney,\u00a0Daniel Richman<\/strong>.<\/p>\n And with that, the entire story of Comey\u2019s post-2016 behavior \u2014 from his media leaks to his under-oath denials before Congress \u2014 is being rewritten before the public\u2019s eyes.<\/p>\n When the indictment first dropped, Washington insiders were glued to one question: who exactly were these unnamed \u201cpersons\u201d connected to the former FBI chief\u2019s alleged crimes?<\/p>\n Now that their identities are known, the puzzle pieces fall into place.<\/p>\n According to\u00a0ABC News investigative reporter Mike Levine<\/strong>, who broke the confirmation late Friday night, the DOJ\u2019s first count against Comey centers on\u00a0<\/p>\n false statements<\/strong>\u00a0made to the\u00a0Senate Judiciary Committee<\/strong>\u00a0in September 2020 \u2014 specifically, his sworn insistence that he never \u201cauthorized someone else at the FBI to be an anonymous source in news reports\u201d regarding an investigation connected to Hillary Clinton.<\/p>\n The indictment tells a different story.<\/p>\n \u201cThat statement was false,\u201d it reads. \u201cBecause, as JAMES B. COMEY JR. then and there knew, he in fact had authorized PERSON 3 to serve as an anonymous source in news reports regarding [the] FBI investigation.\u201d<\/p>\n That single line may become one of the most damning sentences in Comey\u2019s career.<\/p>\n Not only does it accuse the former FBI director of\u00a0lying under oath<\/strong>, but it also establishes that his \u201canonymous source\u201d was\u00a0<\/p>\n But prosecutors say that wasn\u2019t a casual leak. It was deliberate \u2014 and part of a long-running effort by Comey to control public narratives surrounding Hillary Clinton and the FBI\u2019s actions in the tumultuous final months of the 2016 election.<\/p>\n A Hidden Channel to the Press<\/p>\n The revelations go deeper than anyone expected.<\/p>\n Levine\u2019s follow-up reporting cited internal FBI documents showing that Comey didn\u2019t just\u00a0tolerate<\/strong>\u00a0Richman\u2019s media connections \u2014 he\u00a0<\/p>\n empowered<\/strong>\u00a0them.<\/p>\n \u201cWhile Comey instructed the FBI to hire Richman as a Special Government Employee \u2014 with Top Secret clearance \u2014 to work on \u2018Going Dark\u2019 matters, Comey also used Richman as a liaison to the media,\u201d the report states.<\/p>\n That phrasing \u2014 \u201cliaison to the media\u201d \u2014 jumps off the page.<\/p>\n In plain language, it means the man tasked with protecting the nation\u2019s most sensitive secrets allegedly built his own secret back channel to shape press coverage, defend his reputation, and possibly shield political allies.<\/p>\n The FBI\u2019s 2021 internal report spelled it out:<\/p>\n \u201cRichman contacted journalists to correct stories critical of Comey, the FBI, and to shape future press coverage. Richman did this both when he was an SGE and after he resigned from the FBI.\u201d<\/p>\n This paints a deeply uncomfortable picture for both men.<\/p>\n Comey, once held up as a symbol of bureaucratic integrity, now stands accused of manipulating the media through an insider \u2014 someone with clearance, connections, and access to privileged FBI information.<\/p>\n And that insider \u2014 Richman \u2014 wasn\u2019t just a friend. He was\u00a0the \u201canonymous source\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0in stories about Hillary Clinton\u2019s FBI investigation, the one Comey swore didn\u2019t exist.<\/p>\n The Leak Trail<\/p>\n It wasn\u2019t the first time Comey\u2019s relationship with Richman raised red flags.<\/p>\n In 2017, after Comey\u2019s dismissal by President Trump, Richman became the messenger for one of the most infamous leaks in modern political history. It was Richman who\u00a0<\/p>\n hand-delivered Comey\u2019s personal memos<\/strong>\u00a0to The New York Times \u2014 memos detailing private conversations with Trump that ultimately helped trigger the appointment of Special Counsel Robert Mueller.<\/p>\n At the time, Comey defended the move, calling it a moral decision. \u201cI thought it was important for the public to see the contents,\u201d he told Congress.<\/p>\n But now, prosecutors allege that wasn\u2019t the only time Comey used his friend to leak \u2014 and that the earlier leaks were not about \u201cTrump,\u201d but about\u00a0Hillary Clinton.<\/strong><\/p>\n In short, the new indictment reframes Comey not as a one-time whistleblower, but as a repeat political manipulator who\u00a0weaponized information<\/strong>\u00a0from inside the FBI to protect some and target others.<\/p>\n In fairness, Daniel Richman has long denied any wrongdoing. During the FBI\u2019s 2021 internal probe, Richman told investigators that Comey\u00a0\u201cnever asked him to talk to the media.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n But the paper trail tells another story.<\/p>\n Even in redacted form, the FBI documents show that Richman\u00a0did<\/strong>\u00a0speak with reporters about\u00a0\u201csensitive information.\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0And he did so while holding \u2014 and after resigning from \u2014 a position with\u00a0Top Secret clearance.<\/strong><\/p>\n That revelation raises fresh questions about why someone with such clearance would be permitted to act as an off-the-record intermediary to journalists \u2014 and whether the information he leaked might have violated federal law.<\/p>\n The DOJ\u2019s indictment doesn\u2019t go that far \u2014 yet. But its tone makes clear that prosecutors believe Comey\u00a0knowingly authorized<\/strong>\u00a0Richman\u2019s actions and then\u00a0lied about it under oath<\/strong>.<\/p>\n For years, the name James Comey has hovered like a ghost over American politics \u2014 haunting both parties, symbolizing both defiance and distrust.<\/p>\n To Democrats, Comey was once the man who helped derail Hillary Clinton\u2019s 2016 campaign by publicly announcing a renewed email investigation just days before Election Day. To Republicans, he became the FBI director who turned the bureau into a political tool to undermine Donald Trump.<\/p>\n Now, this indictment \u2014 and the unmasking of PERSON 1 and PERSON 3 \u2014 ties both legacies together.<\/p>\n Comey\u2019s actions, prosecutors allege, were not the product of loyalty to law or principle but a carefully managed campaign of\u00a0media manipulation<\/strong>, designed to protect the image of the FBI and shield certain individuals from scrutiny.<\/p>\n And in the process, they say, he broke the very laws he was sworn to uphold.<\/p>\n The specific legal language in the indictment carries enormous weight.<\/p>\n By stating that Comey \u201cwillfully and knowingly\u201d lied under oath, the DOJ is signaling that this was\u00a0not an accidental misstatement<\/strong>\u00a0or a lapse in memory. It was deliberate.<\/p>\n That phrasing mirrors other historic perjury and obstruction cases \u2014 including those that took down public figures from Richard Nixon\u2019s aides to Bill Clinton\u2019s associates during the 1990s.<\/p>\n The legal stakes are serious. If convicted, Comey could face\u00a0up to five years in federal prison per count<\/strong>, along with fines and the permanent loss of his security clearance and professional credentials.<\/p>\n But the political stakes may be even higher.<\/p>\n That Hillary Clinton \u2014 the 2016 Democratic nominee and longtime political heavyweight \u2014 has now been confirmed as\u00a0\u201cPERSON 1\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0in the Comey indictment adds a shocking twist.<\/p>\n For years, Clinton has sought to distance herself from Comey\u2019s actions, often blaming his October 2016 letter to Congress for damaging her campaign at the worst possible moment.<\/p>\n Now, the DOJ is formally acknowledging that Comey\u2019s alleged lies to Congress revolved around\u00a0his handling of media leaks connected to her FBI investigation.<\/strong><\/p>\n That revelation reopens old wounds \u2014 not just for the Democratic Party but for millions of Americans who never felt they got the full truth about the Clinton email saga.<\/p>\n Within minutes of the ABC report confirming the identities of PERSON 1 and PERSON 3, social media exploded.<\/p>\n Conservatives hailed the news as \u201cvindication,\u201d calling the indictment a long-overdue reckoning for a man they believe turned the FBI into a political weapon.<\/p>\n \u201cFinally. The truth is coming out,\u201d one viral post read. \u201cComey lied. Clinton benefited. The media helped.\u201d<\/p>\n Meanwhile, most major networks \u2014 CNN, MSNBC, even The Washington Post \u2014 responded cautiously, opting for terse headlines without commentary. That silence spoke volumes.<\/p>\n Even among Comey\u2019s former allies, few were willing to publicly defend him.<\/p>\n As one former DOJ official told Politico anonymously, \u201cIf what\u2019s in that indictment holds up, it\u2019s devastating. You can\u2019t lie to Congress, and you can\u2019t authorize leaks through back channels. This isn\u2019t going away.\u201d<\/p>\n The irony, of course, is that both Hillary Clinton and James Comey were once central players in the same political drama.<\/p>\n Comey\u2019s original investigation into Clinton\u2019s private email server dominated the 2016 campaign. His later firing by Trump became the catalyst for the Russia probe that consumed Trump\u2019s presidency.<\/p>\n Now, almost a decade later, those same two figures \u2014 Clinton and Comey \u2014 are back in the headlines together, their names linked again under the cold, black ink of a criminal indictment.<\/p>\n The entire saga has come full circle.<\/p>\n What happens next will depend on the courts \u2014 but the ripple effects are already being felt across Washington.<\/p>\n Multiple congressional Republicans have called for\u00a0a full public release of all FBI communications<\/strong>\u00a0between Comey and Richman, including encrypted messages and phone logs. Others are demanding a review of every classified document Richman accessed during his time as a \u201cSpecial Government Employee.\u201d<\/p>\n Even some Democrats have privately acknowledged that the optics are \u201cterrible.\u201d One House staffer told reporters, \u201cIf it\u2019s true that Comey used his security-cleared friend as a media cutout while denying it to Congress, that\u2019s indefensible. Period.\u201d<\/p>\n James Comey once said that sunlight was \u201cthe best disinfectant.\u201d He used that phrase often \u2014 in speeches, in interviews, and in testimony \u2014 to justify the FBI\u2019s transparency during controversial investigations.<\/p>\n Now, that same sunlight is turning on him.<\/p>\n And with Hillary Clinton confirmed as PERSON 1 and Daniel Richman exposed as PERSON 3, the story he thought he\u2019d buried has come roaring back from the shadows.<\/p>\n The man who once stood before Congress as a self-proclaimed defender of truth and transparency is now accused of concealing both.<\/p>\n And this time, there\u2019s no one left to leak for him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The corruption investigation that has ensnared Los Angeles City Councilman Curren Price represents one of the most complex and financially significant cases of municipal fraud in recent California history. The Los Angeles…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12645,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12646","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hot-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t