Here are dates of some key events in the FBI's Operation Plunder Dome
public corruption investigation.:
- April 1999: Operation Plunder Dome goes public when FBI seizes
documents from five city offices. Top two city Tax Board officials
charged with soliciting bribes for property tax breaks.
- December 1999: Attorney John Scungio pleads guilty to lying to federal
agents when he denied delivering a bribe to top tax official on behalf
of a client.
- December 1999: Tax Board Chairman Joseph Pannone pleads guilty to 14
corruption charges.
- January 2000: Attorney Angelo Mosca Jr. pleads guilty to helping
arrange a $15,000 bribe to two city officials to settle back taxes on
behalf of a client.
- February 2000: Tax Board Vice Chairman David C. Ead pleads guilty to
arranging bribes with city officials.
- March 2000: On secretly recorded FBI tape played in court, Pannone
says Mayor Vincent A. Cianci Jr. gave him tips on how to collect bribes.
Cianci denies any wrongdoing
- March 2000: Tax Collector Anthony E. Annarino pleads guilty to
attempted extortion, admitting he took $6,000 in bribes.
- March 2000: Deputy tax assessor Rosemary Glancy, the only Plunder Dome
defendant at the time to claim innocence and go to trial, is convicted
of attempted extortion and other counts.
- June 2000: Frank E. Corrente, the former top aide to Cianci, indicted
on charges he arranged bribes for city leases and contracts.
- July 2000: Federal judge, in remarks during a sentencing hearing,
accuses Cianci of running the most corrupt administration in state
history. Cianci, who was not present, denies any wrongdoing.
- August 2000: Cianci sells his house for $1.3 million and puts his
51-foot yacht on the market for $237,900. He denies the sale was meant
to raise money for a possible defense if he's indicted.
- September 2000: Cianci moves into the Biltmore Hotel. FBI subpoenas
four workers from Cianci's campaign and four City Hall employees to
testify before grand jury.
- January 2001: Glancy, who fell gravely ill just weeks after reporting
to prison and was given a compassionate release, dies of kidney and
liver failure.
- January 2001: NBC affiliate plays FBI surveillance tape showing
Corrente taking a $1,000 cash bribe to arrange a lease for a businessman
working undercover for the government.
- February 2001: Brown University poll finds 61 percent of respondents
believe Cianci is doing an excellent or good job.
- April 2001: Cianci, Corrente and four others indicted.
- June 2001: Assistant U.S. Attorney Richard W. Rose, the lead
prosecutor, fined $500 and suspended from the case for 30 days for
showing a secret FBI surveillance tape to two friends and his sister.
- March 2002: Judge rules that Cianci Chief of Staff Artin Coloian to be
tried separately on government corruption charges.
- March 2002: Pannone pleads guilty taking bribes in exchange for
reducing tax bills and securing city contracts.
- April 17: Operation Plunder Dome trial begins in U.S. District Court,
Providence.
- May 24: Pannone sentenced to 60 months in prison for taking bribes in
exchange for reducing tax bills and securing city contracts.
- June 4: U.S. District Judge Ernest Torres acquits Cianci on five of 17
corruption charges, but leaves intact more serious allegations that he
headed a criminal empire out of City Hall.
- June 24: Jury reaches verdict. Cianci convicted of racketeering
conspiracy, found innocent on 11 other charges. Corrente convicted of
seven charges; businessman Richard Autiello convicted on three charges.
- Sept. 6: Cianci sentenced to five years and four months for
racketeering conspiracy; Corrente sentenced to five years and three
months; Autiello sentenced to three years and 10 months. Also on this
day, Cianci resigned as mayor. He later takes a job as a radio talk-show
host.
- Dec. 5: Cianci leaves Providence and reports the next day to Fort Dix,
N.J., low-security prison.
- May 28, 2003: An appeal to Cianci's racketeering conspiracy conviction
is filed in the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston.
- October 2003: Lawyers argue Cianci's appeal before the 1st Circuit.
- November 2003: The U.S. Department of Justice presents its Director's
Award to each member of the five-person team that prosecuted Operation
Plunder Dome.
- June 21, 2004: Federal appeals court upholds lower court's decision to
hold a local television reporter in contempt for refusing to reveal who
leaked an undercover videotape during the corruption investigation.
- Aug. 10, 2004: Federal appeals court upholds the convictions of
Cianci, Autiello and Corrente.
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