John Celona was forceful in his written updates to a Roger Williams Medical Center executive about his efforts to pressure a state legislator who had sponsored legislation that the hospital opposed.

He wrote that he tried to reach the legislator, Rep. Joanne Giannini, D-Providence, by phone. He looked for her in the parking lot at the State House. And when he finally did catch up with her, he wrote then-hospital vice president Frances P. Driscoll, he bluntly warned Giannini that bucking the hospital’s position “could be a political problem.”

Consequently, Celona reported, Giannini backed down and promised to let him know in the future before introducing any bills affecting Roger Williams.

But Celona made it all up, Giannini told jurors yesterday.

Testifying in the second week of the retrial of Driscoll and former Roger Williams president Robert A. Urciuoli, Giannini repudiated Celona’s memos, which a prosecutor had introduced as evidence that Urciuoli and Driscoll corruptly used Celona, a paid consultant, to influence legislation. The two former executives were convicted in 2006, but a federal appeals court ordered a new trial early this year, citing flawed jury instructions by the judge.

In 1999 and 2000, Giannini was a sponsor of legislation involving the creation of a Rhode Island Cancer Council and legislation that would have required nonprofit institutions in Providence, including Roger Williams, to make payments in lieu of taxes (PILOT) to the City of Providence.

Roger Williams opposed both bills and, according to Celona’s missives to Driscoll, he actively worked on Giannini, whose Providence district includes Roger Williams, to change her tune.

“I told her in simple terms that being supportive of this bill could be a political problem in the future for her,” Celona wrote Driscoll in 1999, regarding the Cancer Council bill.

That same year, Celona, who was a $700-a-week consultant to the hospital’s affiliated assisted-living center, wrote Driscoll again regarding the PILOT legislation, which had been a perennial loser at the State House.

“I informed [Giannini] that [the legislation] would be extremely harmful to RWMC if passed,” wrote Celona. He also wrote, “I told her that she should watch what she signs in the future.”

And after seeing Giannini participate in a roundtable discussion involving the proposed Cancer Council in 2000, Celona wrote Driscoll, “I’ll have to have another ‘talk’ with her about [t]he pledge to me to run any other health care activities by me and RWMC prior to participation.”

But then Giannini took the stand and said that Celona never pressured her on anything.

“I never agreed to talk to him or pledged to run health-care activities by him,” testified Giannini, her voice rising in anger. “He never talked to me about doing that.”

Urciuoli’s lawyer, Howard M. Cooper, asked Giannini about a memo in which Celona wrote Driscoll that he had used his “good relationship with Rep. Giannini” to convince her “to do nothing to support the bill” that she had co-sponsored creating a Cancer Council.

“That never happened either, did it?” asked Cooper.

“No,” replied Giannini. “I don’t remember these conversations ever taking place.”

Furthermore, a defense lawyer later pointed out, Celona voted in favor of the Cancer Council legislation, even though Roger Williams opposed it.

Giannini also denied being pressured about the Cancer Council legislation during a lunch she had with Celona and Driscoll.

The lunch, at Camille’s Roman Garden on Providence’s Federal Hill, mainly involved “pleasantries.” Giannini said that the issue of cancer treatment was important to her, because her mother had recently died of cancer, and that Driscoll expressed her condolences during the lunch.

According to Giannini, Driscoll said: “I saw you’re working with the Cancer Council. We do that work, too, at the hospital.”

That, said Giannini, was “the only thing I remember” being said about the matter during lunch.

Under cross-examination by the defense, Giannini said that no one at Roger Williams ever told her the hospital’s position on the Cancer Council or PILOT legislation.

The prosecution asserts that Urciuoli and Driscoll wanted the Cancer Council killed because its members included two former Roger Williams doctors whom Urciuoli disliked. The defense counters that one of the doctors had been fired by Roger Williams for misappropriating grant money.

Giannini was one of five witnesses yesterday.

The day began with Thomas L. Slowey, Roger Williams’ former chief financial officer, testifying about the arrangement under which Celona was paid. Because the hospital’s partner — The Village at Elmhurst — refused to pay Celona, Roger Williams paid his salary, reimbursing The Village from its capital account, not the operating account from which vendors were usually paid.

Under questioning from defense lawyers, however, Slowey said that Celona’s hiring was no secret and that he had no objection to the arrangement.

Christopher Reilly, a former public relations and development employee at Roger Williams, testified next that he would see Celona visiting Urciuoli at the hospital and in other meetings at Roger Williams. Reilly said that Celona was involved in meetings about a hospital program to provide medical services to retired union workers.

Giannini followed Reilly to the stand and was in turn set to be followed by another legislator, Sen. Mary Ellen Goodwin, D-Providence, whose name had also surfaced as having been invited to the lunch at Camille’s. Goodwin did not attend the lunch, however, and testified at the first trial of the hospital executives two years ago that Urciuoli had never asked her to assist the hospital on legislation that prosecutors say he directed Celona on.

But after a flurry of defense objections to prosecution questions of Giannini regarding a face-to-face conversation she had with Celona on the PILOT legislation, Chief U.S. District Judge Mary M. Lisi refused to allow the witness to answer. And after a brief sidebar, the prosecution decided not to call Goodwin to the stand, at least yesterday, and instead called Richard Gamache, who runs Elmhurst Extended Care, the nursing home affiliated with Roger Williams.

Gamache testified that he didn’t become aware that Celona’s consulting agreement called for him to help promote the nursing home, as well as the assisted-living center, until the end of 2002, a little more than three years after Gamache was hired.

Gamache testified that Urciuoli directed him to talk to Celona when he was seeking grants to expand an Alzheimer’s unit at the nursing home, and that Celona provided him with a few names for leads. Gamache also testified that he appeared on Celona’s cable-access television show to promote the nursing home.

Brian Jordan, a former lobbyist for Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island, was the day’s final witness.

Jordan testified that he attended a meeting at Celona’s State House office in 2001 or 2002 regarding Roger Williams’ dispute with Blue Cross over reimbursements to the hospital. Also at the meeting were Blue Cross vice presidents Lynn Urbani and Thomas Lynch, a former state senator, as well as Celona and Urciuoli.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Luis Matos asked Jordan if Blue Cross leaders felt pressured to attend because of Celona’s position as the chairman of a powerful Senate committee that oversaw health-care legislation.

“Senator Celona helped set the agenda for bills that would be heard,” said Jordan.

mstanton@projo.com