Two former FirstEnergy Corp. executives are once again asking to see secret grand jury testimony from an agent with Ohio’s Bureau of Criminal Investigation whom the executives said may have provided “materially false or misleading” testimony in their case.
In a Monday afternoon filing in Summit County Court of Common Pleas, ex-FirstEnergy CEO Chuck Jones and former Senior Vice President Michael Dowling asked the court to review all grand jury testimony from the BCI agent who they say was the primary investigator on their case. The pair are accused of paying a $4.3 million bribe to the state’s top public utilities official in exchange for favorable regulatory treatment.
The agent, Eric Lehnhart, is the subject of an ongoing internal investigation by the Ohio Attorney General’s office, the filing said. It asks Summit County Judge Susan Baker Ross to examine the grand jury testimony in chambers — away from the public and the press — and disclose to the defendants transcripts reflecting the agent’s testimony, including those that summarize witness interviews.
The filing claims that because the internal investigation showed Lehnhart entered inaccurate and false facts in investigatory reports in another case, “there is a serious risk” that he also “provided materially false or misleading grand jury testimony” in this case…