The FBI and U.S. Attorneys Office started piecing together a case against powerful ex-Sen. Vincent Fumo receipt by receipt. There were skeptics who thought they couldn’t make a case. The group of lawyers and investigators proved them wrong. Here’s how.
By Emilie Lounsberry and Craig R. McCoy
Inquirer Staff Writers
PHILADELPHIA — It was early in the investigation, but already the FBI was getting on Vince Fumo’s nerves.
In a typically blunt e-mail, he wrote to a top aide in 2004 that a delicate part of his anatomy had just been “busted by my 2 friendly female FBI agents.”
Then he cursed them.
His aide replied: “I do not like those people. Long live the realm of Fumo-world! :-)”
Now former State Sen. Fumo stands convicted of scores of counts of corruption in a $4 million fraud, his aide has lost his job, and Fumo-world is a smoking ruin.
Relentlessly civil, but also downright relentless, FBI Agents Vicki Humphreys and Kathleen T. McAfee scrutinized Home Depot receipts and analyzed American Express card bills, tallied up toll slips and tracked down yacht captains, all to build a case that everyone told them they could never construct.
They were joined by Assistant U.S. Attorneys John J. Pease and Robert A. Zauzmer
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