FBI Indicts John Wiley Price: South Dallas’ “Man Downtown” Faces Bribery Charges

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John Wiley Price's Home at 406 E. 5th Street in North Oak Cliff

John Wiley Price’s Home at 510 E. 5th Street in North Oak Cliff

John Wiley Price was arrested this morning at 8 a.m. on an FBI indictment alleging bribery, mail fraud, tax fraud, and other crimes associated with influence peddling. Co-defendants in the 107-page indictment, which was released this morning, include longtime assistant to Price Dapheny Fain and political consultant Kathy Nealy. A fourth defendant, Christian Lloyd Campbell, was also named in the document.

Price’s attorney, Billy Ravkind, was stunned by this morning’s arrest, alleging that neither he nor his client knew that the indictment was coming out today. Jim Schutze thinks that this means that there is no cooperation coming from Price or his associates, or that a crucial player has recently opted to flip to federal authorities. We’re certain that things will become more clear after the U.S. Attorney addresses the media later today, and as the days and weeks progress.

One thing is certain: a lot of real assets will likely get caught up in this arrest and indictment, one that is swiftly becoming the biggest public corruption case Dallas has ever seen. Price currently resides at 510 E. 5th Street in North Oak Cliff, which was raided by the FBI almost three years ago to the day, but he was listed as owner for several other properties, too. Agents found more than $229,000 in cash inside Price’s home during the June 2011 raid, which also targeted Fain and Nealy’s homes and offices.

“The U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Texas will lay out charges against Price at a news conference later this morning. Court documents filed since a raid on Price’s home and office over three years ago depict a wide-ranging probe of his business transactions, personal financial activities including land transactions and a bankruptcy,” said Schutze in his post from this morning.

UPDATE: U.S. District Attorney Sarah Saldana addressed the press, laying out the charges against Price, Fain, Nealy, and Campbell. All four are alleged to be conspirators in a plan that funneled Dallas County contracts and payoffs to Price and his associates, some of which involved car payments and insurance, as well as real estate and rental income according to a DMN report:

The indictment unsealed Friday alleges that Nealy provided Price “the full use of a new Chevrolet Avalanche” approximately every four years and a BMW 645Ci convertible,” making car payments and insurance payments that totaled more than $191,000.

Nealy is accused of secretly funneling almost $200,000 to Price as a “straw purchaser of four pieces of real estate, and handing over about $113,600 in rent payments from a property.

UPDATE 2: All four defendants were walked into a courtroom Earl Cabell Federal Building downtown today in cuffs, and all four plead “not guilty” to the charges against them.

Price was led into court along with longtime assistant Dapheny Fain, 52, political consultant Kathy Nealy, 61, and Nealy associate Christian Lloyd Campbell, 44. All had their hands cuffed behind their backs, and the commissioner was dressed in a shirt and dark slacks, without his signature bow tie.

He and the others were later freed on bond. As Price left the courthouse, all that he would say was that he was not guilty and he was eager to get back to work.

 

 

 

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Joanna England is the Executive Editor at CandysDirt.com and covers the North Texas housing market.

2 Comments

  1. Candy Evans on July 25, 2014 at 6:09 pm

    Wow. Just wow.

  2. dormand on July 26, 2014 at 3:24 pm

    Dallas was fortunate to have had the services for some time of two individuals noted by their professional peers as the very best in the nation in their respective fields:

    Ron Anderson has been for years the consensus most effective CEO of an urban indigent care hospital in the nation.
    In one very critical area, managing low birthweight babies, Parkland Memorial Hospital set the national standard for best practices at eliminating the root causes of factors that contribute to indigent mothers ( frequently children having children in our State noted for dysfunctional sex education processes .) As EVERY SINGLE neonatal intensive care unit admission has an incremental cost to Dallas County taxpayers of $200,000, this is critical not only to having healthier babies, but in avoiding excessive costs to taxpayers.

    Bruce Sherbet was ranked as head and shoulders above any other county election official in the nation for years due to his organizational effectiveness and preventive maintenance protocols to keep election officials trained and informed and to keep election equipment properly maintained and calibrated. Not one single individual in the country even approached the unanimous votes year after year of Bruce Sherbet being the most effective county election official in the nation.

    Both Ron Anderson and Bruce Sherbet were given pure hell month after month and year after year by Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley Price as they came before the Dallas County Commissioners Court to request the resources that they needed to keep their respective organizations at the very top levels of performance.

    Thanks to one John Wiley Price, the exceptional performance of both Ron Anderson and of Bruce Sherbet were lost to the citizen taxpayers of Dallas County. Each was succeeded by a markedly inferior manager, This has made Dallas County far less attractive to those task forces that seek the very best headquarters relocation sites for world class companies.

    I infer that neither Mr. Anderson nor Mr. Sherbet has shed one tear over the arrest by the FBI of the person who was an albatross for many years in their exceptional performance for Dallas County.

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