Operation Pretense
returns to spotlight
By By Terry Cassreino / assistant managing editor
March 23, 2003
Eddie Moffat's trite response was hardly surprising given the fact that many convicted felons say the same thing over and over to anyone who will listen.
So nearly 15 years after he was convicted in federal court as part of a statewide undercover sting of county officials, Moffat hopes to return to the Harrison County Board of Supervisors.
The Gulfport resident has his eyes set squarely on the same supervisor's post he held from 1985 until he was forced to resign after pleading guilty in September 1988 to taking kickbacks.
And he swears to this date that he wasn't guilty. It was all a con engineered by the FBI, Moffat said, and he was the unlikely target and an unfortunate victim.
Well, there's more to the story read on.
Moffat was one of 56 county supervisors statewide caught in Operation Pretense, an FBI undercover investigation of corruption in county purchasing practices
The probe uncovered instances of extortion, kickbacks and bid-rigging. It nailed supervisors in 26 counties, including two from Lauderdale County: Billy Joe Harris and the Rev. William Brown.
It also led to reforms in county government, including the widespread adoption of the county unit system which features one centralized purchasing system for the entire county.
In Harrison County on the Mississippi Coast, a county whose name was synonymous with widespread corruption in the 1950s and 1960s, Moffat was the only supervisor caught in Operation Pretense.
Moffat admitted in court to taking $950 in kickbacks from an equipment company salesman.
Moffat even initialed a rough draft of a January 1988 news story in which he admitted he took money. The story was published in The Sun Herald on the Coast.
If Coast voters conveniently forget all of that and elect Moffat in November, he would become the second Operation Pretense alumnus to return to public office.
The other was David Fancher who returned to the Attala County Board of Supervisors in 1995 after doing time in prison for taking $170 in kickbacks on county purchases.
But Moffat's re-election is not necessarily a given. University of Southern Mississippi professor James R. Crockett said voters likely will think twice before supporting Moffat.
Crockett is an expert on the FBI sting who spent five years researching and writing "Operation Pretense," a 339-page book that looks in-depth at the investigation. He became intrigued because of his background in accounting.
But Moffat ignores everything his prison time, his fines and what amounted to a signed confession that appeared in the newspaper. He doesn't even believe he violated the people's trust
He's honest. Really.
