St. Louis lawyer says anonymous cash tied to Greitens case likely came from GOP donor
A wealthy Republican donor may have provided the anonymous cash payments to the St. Louis lawyer who helped publicize the allegations against Gov. Eric Greitens.
Al Watkins, the attorney for the ex-husband of Greitens’ alleged victim, said Thursday that his understanding was that the $100,000 he received in January came from a GOP donor. However, Watkins said that he did not know the person’s identity and contended that it doesn’t matter.
He said it was his understanding that the Republican did not like Greitens and it was personal. He said he didn't know what that meant or whether it had anything to do with low-income housing tax credits, a theory that was popularized by Greitens’ defense team.
"If Jesus Christ himself rose once again and brought gold tablets to me and a pack of Camel cigarettes emblazoned in gold and whispered in my ear you have a free ticket to heaven for eternity if you just wreak havoc on the governor’s life, so what? What does that have to do with what the governor did ... in 2015?" Watkins said.
Half of the money was delivered by Scott Faughn, the publisher of The Missouri Times, but in an interview Tuesday Watkins disputed Faughn’s claim that the money came from his own account and that it was related to research for a book.
Watkins also said that he has been in contact with the FBI about Greitens since 2016 and that he sent a photograph of the money to an FBI agent after receiving it in January.
Greitens had faced a felony indictment for invasion of privacy based on allegations that he took a photograph of his alleged victim without her consent in 2015, an allegation that became public after her ex-husband, Watkins' client, agreed to an interview with KMOV-TV in St. Louis earlier this year.
The St. Louis circuit attorney’s office dropped the case Monday after a judge agreed to let Greitens’ defense team depose St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner about alleged perjury by an investigator in the case.
This story was originally published May 17, 2018 at 11:02 AM with the headline "St. Louis lawyer says anonymous cash tied to Greitens case likely came from GOP donor."