These crimes raise serious questions about possible use of deliberate intimidation tactics not only because of who the victims are and the already wide criticism of the prosecutions to begin with, but also because of the suspicious nature of each incident individually as well as the pattern collectively. Typically burglars do not break-into an office or private residence only to rummage through documents, for example, as is the case with most of the burglaries in these two federal cases.

In Alabama, for instance, the home of former Democratic Governor Don Siegelman was burglarized twice during the period of his first indictment. Nothing of value was taken, however, and according to the Siegelman family, the only items of interest to the burglars were the files in Siegelman's home office.

Siegelman's attorney experienced the same type of break-in at her office.

In neighboring Mississippi, a case brought against a trial lawyer and three judges raises even more disturbing questions. Of the four individuals in the same case, three of the US Attorney’s targets were the victims of crimes during their indictment or trial. This case, like that of Governor Siegelman, has been widely criticized as a politically motivated prosecution by a Bush US Attorney.

The incidents are not limited to burglaries. In Mississippi, former Judge John Whitfield was the victim of arson at his office. In Alabama, the whistleblower in the Don Siegelman case, Dana Jill Simpson, had her home burned down, and shortly thereafter her car was allegedly forced off the road.

While there is no direct evidence linking these crimes to the US Attorneys’ office targeting these individuals, or to the Bush administration, there is a distinct pattern that makes it highly unlikely that these incidents are isolated and unrelated.

All of these crimes remain unsolved.

[Thom Hartmann]: And, in fact, if I understand this correctly, you were being prosecuted by a woman whose husband was the campaign manager for the Republican who ran against you for governor and in the middle of the night in one county because of a voting machine malfunction after the election had apparently already been called in your favor, suddenly in the middle of the night when there were nobody expect Republicans standing around, they discovered a couple thousand more votes and said 'Oh, yeah, no no, Don Siegelman actually lost'. Do I have that right?

[cross talk]

[Don Siegelman]: You have it right. They electronically shifted votes from my column to my Republican's column.

[Thom Hartmann]: To Bob Riley's column.

[Don Siegelman]: I believe, yes, to Bob Riley's column. And oddly enough, it didn't effect a single down-ballot race. They took five thousand or six thousand votes of mine and shifted it over to Bob Riley and when they counted everybody else's votes, the shift at the top which logically would have made a difference at the bottom...

[Thom Hartmann]: Sure.

[Don Siegelman]: You know, had no impact whatsoever.

[Thom Hartmann]: So the people running for the lesser state offices, the folks who voted Democratic right down the ticket all of a sudden at the very top of the ticket were 'Oh, I'm going to vote for every Democrat except Don Siegelman, I'll put that over to Riley ' and only in this one area in this one county on this one set of machines that was discovered in the middle of the night. by the Republicans.

[Don Siegelman]: Yes, a couple of other interesting things, Thom, since you brought this up, but the two people who either were given credit or who gave themselves credit for stealing the election and swinging the election to my Republican opponent for catching this 'electronic glitch' as they called it, one was Karl Rove's partner, business partner, her name was Kitty McCullough also known as Kelly, oh gosh, I can't remember what her second name was but she had a different married name.

[Thom Hartmann]: But she's the one who discovered the extra votes that caused you to lose and caused Bob Riley to won, OK.

[Don Siegelman]: And the other person was a guy named Dan Gans who right after that went to work for an Abramoff/Tom Delay related company, a group called the Alexander Strategies Group. And he claimed credit on his web site that he was responsible for this, because he had an expertese in electronic ballot security.