Embattled Rangel Hires Firm to Probe Finances

By Susan Crabtree, The Hill

November 14, 2008

Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) has hired the accounting firm of Watkins, Meegan, Drury and Company to investigate his financial records and prepare a report for the House ethics committee.

The selection of Watkins, Meegan comes two months after Rangel first announced he would hire a forensic auditor to investigate 20 years of his personal income taxes and financial disclosure records, which are riddled with areas.

The Washington area-based public accounting firm employs 200 professionals and has been in business for more than 30 years. Mary Lou Gervie, a forensic accountant and a former revenue agent with the IRS, will lead the investigations into Rangel’s record, Rangel’s office said in a release.

“Congressman Rangel himself initiated the ethics committee review and is committed to ensuring full compliance with the House's high ethical standards,” said the statement, which sought to underscore Rangel’s intention to comply with the ethics investigation initiated in last September.

“In this and all other respects, the Congressman is providing all information needed by the committee to reach its conclusions, and looks forward to a rapid resolution of this matter.”

The ethics panel launched the probe after Rangel took the unusual step of calling on it to review the array of allegations piling up around him.

Rangel also called on the media to respect his silence on the matter until the ethics committee concludes its work.

“Out of respect for the ethics committee process, the Congressman or his representatives will have no further statements regarding these issues until the ethics committee has completed its work,” the statement continued. “He hopes the press will also respect the process.”

Rangel’s attorney, Lanny Davis, has asked the ethics committee for permission to use campaign funds to pay legal expenses incurred from the ethics committee and the forensic audit, what could amount to tens of thousands of dollars, if not hundreds of thousands.

The ethics panel is looking into charges that Rangel failed to properly disclose his assets on tax forms and Congressional financial disclosure forms. It is also reviewing Rangel’s leasing arrangements on four apartments in Harlem-based Lenox Terrace and his fundraising for a City College of New York program bearing his name. In early September, Rangel called on the committee to investigate his failure to report rental income on a villa he owns in the Dominican Republic to the Internal Revenue Service.

Rangel also has rebuffed calls from Republicans to step down from his post as chairman of the powerful Ways and Means Committee.

On a damage control media blitz two months ago, he said he would hire a forensic accounting firm to prepare a comprehensive review of his tax and financial disclosure forms for the past 20 years, which are riddled with errors.