Laurie Coleman

Rod Blagojevich was arrested today on charges that included alleged schemes to funnel money to the Illinois governor through his wife, Patricia. Because the charges against Blagojevich are criminal and made by the U.S. Department of Justice, they are on a wholly different order (at least so far, pending results of a newly reported FBI probe) from allegations about U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman that were made by private plaintiffs in a pair of Texas civil suits from October.

The dissimilarity, however, ends there.

The hottest Senate race in the country is getting a whole lot hotter due to multiple lawsuits alleging that an associate of Sen. Norm Coleman, Nasser Kazeminy, funneled money to Coleman’s wife through an insurance company she works for. The allegations spurred the Coleman campaign to cry foul and attack Al Franken in an ad [...]

Transcript of Coleman’s October 10 press conference.
I had originally planned to exclusively talk about the economy and the financial crisis, which I still intend to address. But, these are fearful anxious times – and people are looking for hope and confidence and leadership.
So, today, I want to talk about hope and confidence and real concerns [...]

Contrary to Norm Coleman’s claims to media on Friday and yesterday, when Coleman a) said that the media (specifically, the Star Tribune) first received information about the claims “last week,” and b) implied that this late, low blow could only have been the work of the Al Franken campaign, Coleman had been asked by reporters about the matter in early October.

Who said so? Norm Coleman. Details inside.

This morning’s news of a second lawsuit alleging the transmission of funds from Nasser Kazeminy to Norm Coleman poses serious complications for Coleman’s “they’re out to get me” defense. Coleman can and probably will claim that this is just further evidence of the vast left-wing conspiracy to do him in, but that seemed unlikely yesterday and seems exponentially more unlikely today.

More about lawsuit number two and other matters inside.

Norm Coleman released a new television ad today accusing his Democratic opponent of orchestrating two lawsuits alleging that Coleman’s longtime political patron funneled $75,000 that was intended to benefit the Senator to a Minneapolis insurance firm. Al Franken denounced and denied the allegation this afternoon, accusing the incumbent of lying to voters.

The AP’s Fred Frommer writes:
“Sen. Norm Coleman is planning to make a statement on a lawsuit that claims his friend and donor funneled $75,000 to an insurance company that employs the senator’s wife.
“The Coleman re-election campaign has called the allegations ‘baseless and false,’ and ‘an 11th-hour attack.’ The senator’s statement was planned for 10 a.m. [...]

The foregoing is an excerpt from the legal complaint in the case filed this week against Norm Coleman pal Nasser Kazeminy. (Our previous coverage of this story is here and here.)
The full complaint is a PDF file. Start on p10 to find the material concerning Norm and Laurie Coleman.

The figure of Nasser Kazeminy — longtime Norm Coleman friend and patron — is once again casting a shadow over the US Senate campaign. Kazeminy, the man who may or may not have purchased suits for Coleman at Neiman-Marcus once upon a time, was reportedly accused in a lawsuit filed (and withdrawn) this week of funneling money to Coleman’s wife, Laurie Coleman, through a third party.

We know this because there is videotape (published this morning at MnIndy) of Star Tribune reporter Paul McEnroe asking Coleman — or rather, the closed window of Coleman’s SUV — about it.

But whereas McEnroe and Kennedy’s previous inquiries into the Coleman/Kazeminy relationship (the Neiman-Marcus affair) never yielded a story in the paper, this one has to. A quick recapitulation of the main known facts in the matter explains why.

There is a new factor in play in the Minnesota US Senate race, and it’s too soon to tell whether it will affect the tight contest between Sen. Norm Coleman, Al Franken and Dean Barkley.

The Pioneer Press’s Rachel Stassen-Berger has some details in her morning dispatch on the race. Coleman apparently freaked out after Star Tribune investigative reporters Paul McEnroe and Tony Kennedy showed up at a St. Cloud rally and tried to ask Coleman for comment on a lawsuit filed Tuesday in Texas — and withdrawn Wednesday — against Coleman “suitgate” pal Nasser Kazeminy.