Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, January 14, 1992 TAG: 9201140168
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A1 EDITION: STATE
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
EX-ROBB AIDE WILL PLEAD GUILTY
A television station reported Monday that Steve Johnson, former press secretary to Sen. Charles Robb, D-Va., will plead guilty to a charge involving a taped phone conversation of Gov. Douglas Wilder.WRC-TV in Washington said it was told by unidentified sources that Johnson will enter the plea to a minor federal infraction for conspiring to disclose contents of the tape to reporters in violation of a telephone privacy act.
Johnson, who lives in Charlottesville, did not return a phone call, and his wife said, "I'm not sure he wants to comment about that."
A federal grand jury has been investigating since last summer how Robb's office obtained and handled the Wilder tape. The two Democrats have been shaky political allies who often have disagreed publicly.
Johnson and two other Robb aides, chief of staff David McCloud and adviser Robert Watson, resigned last summer after a transcript of the tape was provided to the press against Robb's orders.
Robert Dunnington, a Virginia Beach bar owner who arranged to get the tape to Robb's office, pleaded guilty in October to a misdemeanor charge of recording the conversation.
In a plea agreement, Dunnington, 44, admitted to a single charge of interrupting and disclosing electronic communications - a cellular phone conversation in 1988 between then-Lt. Gov. Wilder and a political supporter.
No indictments have resulted from the grand jury investigation, and Dunnington's plea was the first criminal action to stem from the case.
In the October 1988 conversation, Wilder was critical of Robb, then running for the U.S. Senate. Published reports had linked Robb to Virginia Beach drug parties, and Wilder said in the conversation that he believed the reports finished Robb politically. Robb denied attending any such parties.
Prosecutors said Dunnington, a Robb supporter who lives in Virginia Beach, had a hobby of monitoring and recording cellular calls using electronic equipment in his home. One of the hundreds of calls he overheard was made by Wilder.
Dunnington was fined $500 and ordered to spend at least 30 days in a community rehabilitation center.