Stephen Edwards' Request Opposed By Letten
by Laura Maggi - Times-Picayune (excerpt)

U.S. Attorney Jim Letten asked a federal judge Tuesday to reject a request by Stephen Edwards, the son of former Gov. Edwin Edwards, to end his supervised release early to ease his transition back into regular life. Stephen Edwards, convicted along with his father in 2000 of extorting payoffs from casino executives who wanted state riverboat gambling licenses, completed his prison sentence in September 2007. He was released to three years of probation from a halfway house the following March.

His father is in a federal prison in Oakdale, where he is expected to remain until July 6, 2011, according to the Bureau of Prisons Web site.

Since his release, Stephen Edwards has been working as a salesman and installer of awnings, requiring him to travel outside the Baton Rouge-based jurisdiction of his probation, according to a motion filed last week by his attorney, Michael Reese Davis. Each time Edwards does this, he must obtain the permission of the probation office, the lawyer wrote.

Davis argued that Stephen Edwards has been a model prisoner and probationer, showing that supervision is no longer necessary. The time and resources of the probation office are better spent on other offenders, he wrote. But Letten chafed at Davis' characterization of Stephen Edwards as a "one-time offender." Letten said the four-month trial in Baton Rouge showed that Edwards participated in a criminal scheme over a seven-year period.

He was convicted "of a spectrum of serious criminal offenses in which he violated his position of trust as an attorney, and misused as leverage the power of his father as governor of Louisiana to extort monies from businessmen while corrupting the licensing process of an entire fledgling industry in the state of Louisiana," Letten wrote. Letten also pointed out to U.S. District Judge Ralph Tyson that in a letter to the court Stephen Edwards did not acknowledge his "culpability" for his crimes. In the letter, Edwards says that his time in federal prison has taught him the value of life and taught him to appreciate his health and family more than money.