Guilty or innocent, I'll root for Rosty - Rep. Dan Rostenkowski's right to be presumed innocent, regardless of his indictment for defrauding the federal government - Column

0 Comments | Insight on the News, July 4, 1994 | by Lyn Nofziger

So now the federal government has indicted Dan Rostenkowski on 17 felony charges, all revolving around cheating the government.

Does this mean he's guilty? Just because the prosecutor says he is?

Well, the fact is that the news media have already tried and convicted him. Almost every story for months has been written or broadcast on the premise that he is guilty and that all that remains is to determine the appropriate sentence. Talk radio abounds with callers who have made that same assumption - Rostenkowski is a crook.

Guilt, in the eyes of most people, becomes a fact if the news media carry a series of negative stories about a public figure, be it Rostenkowski, President Clinton or Lyn Nofziger, or if there is an official investigation into charges of skulduggery of one sort or another, or if a person is indicted.

But it is well to remember that news stories often take for granted or at least imply things that are not true. The charges that President Bush and former CIA Director William Casey were involved in a so-called October Surprise plot with Iran were eventually proved false, but only after Bush and Casey had been smeared. Hamilton Jordan, President Carter's chief of staff, was charged with using cocaine and the suspicion lingers even though an independent counsel cleared him. The list is long.

To the public, an indictment is almost always a sure sign of guilt. This is so even though most prosecutors admit - indeed, boast - that they can get a grand jury "to indict a ham sandwich." And that is a true statement.

Grand juries initially were supposed to protect the citizen from the almost limitless power of government. Today they have become tools for government to use against citizens. Witnesses summoned by grand juries do not have the right to have counsel in the room with them. They can be, and often are, browbeaten and insulted and threatened by prosecutors and jurors. Tb afl of this they have no recourse. Possible prosecution witnesses can be and often are threatened with perjury and other charges or, if they also are under investigation, are bribed with promises of lesser sentences or even dropped charges.

In Rostenkowski's case, the investigation leading to the indictment took two years, two years in which he was left dangling, not knowing if he would be indicted or turned loose. During that time, he had to try to do the nearly impossible: focus on the business of government and the politics of being reelected while at the same time trying to figure out how to pay his legal bills, which are sure to be astronomical, and confronting the fact that he faces not only disgrace but also prison.

And now with the indictment comes the truly demeaning part. Being forced to step down from the chairmanship he prizes so highly is bad enough, but ahead lie the indignities reserved for the accused: the fingerprinting, the picture taking, the embarrassment of standing up in court while his lawyer pleads him not guilty, the gauntlet of the news media day in and day out, the pity that he doesn't want but will get from friends and kin, the experience of having his most innocent acts turned into crimes by the prosecutor.

All of this Rostenkowski faces, regardless of whether he is finally adjudged guilty or innocent. Regardless, as one who also has stood up to and fought the government, I am certain that Rostenkowski, by refusing to plea bargain, is striking a blow for freedom for all Americans. The idea that government at any level can bring charges against a citizen and then try to cut a deal with him that includes not only jail time but also absolute destruction of a career and maybe bankruptcy to boot should be repugnant to all Americans.

I don't know Dan Rostenkowski, and I don't know if he is guilty or innocent. But I know one thing: I'm rooting for him.