Prosecutors rest case in trial of Kenyatta Johnson and Dawn Chavous, giving floor to defense lawyers to tell their side

Federal prosecutors on Wednesday rested their bribery case against Philadelphia City Councilmember Kenyatta Johnson and his wife, Dawn Chavous, paving the way for the couple to begin presenting their side of the story for the jury that will ultimately decide their fate.

After nearly 10 days of testimony from more than a dozen witnesses, the government’s lawyers ended their presentation by zeroing in on the couple’s finances, councilmanic prerogative, and Chavous’ work for Universal Companies, the South Philadelphia nonprofit whose executives are accused of paying off Johnson with a $67,000 sham consulting contract to his wife in exchange for his assistance with its troubled real estate assets in his district.

» READ MORE: Councilmanic prerogative in Philadelphia: What you need to know

As Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric L. Gibson announced that prosecutors had reached the end of their case, U.S. District Judge Gerald A. McHugh released jurors for the day and said the defense case would begin on Thursday. He then spent the rest of the afternoon hearing a mid-trial push from lawyers for Johnson, Chavous and their two codefendants — Universal’s former CEO Rahim Islam and ex-CFO Shahied Dawan — to dismiss the case before it goes to the jury for a verdict.

The judge denied the request.

Johnson’s lawyer, Patrick Egan, argued that prosecutors had provided no evidence to show that the councilmember, his wife and the two nonprofit executives had conspired in a bribery plot.

Rather, Egan and attorneys for the others have said the alleged scheme had been wholly imagined by the FBI special agent who investigated the case and concluded that Chavous had performed fewer than 40 hours of work for the $67,000 she was paid under a consulting contract with Universal that he said was meant to hide its purported payoff to Johnson.

» READ MORE: Kenyatta Johnson and Dawn Chavous bribery trial: What you need to know

“Correlation does not equal causation,” said Egan. He accused prosecutors of putting Chavous’ work during her contract with Universal “under a magnifying glass” to decide “whether they think it was adequate enough.”

“No rational jury would look at the sole word of one agent,” added Elizabeth Casey, a lawyer for Chavous.

But McHugh said that while the defense had shown that Chavous did some work for Universal with “an email here, an email there,” it was still possible for jurors to conclude that she did “relatively minimal work” based on the evidence presented so far.

» READ MORE: As it happened: The government rests its case in Kenyatta Johnson bribery trial

The defense will now have an opportunity to refute that conclusion as it begins to put on its own case in a presentation expected to take several days and carry the trial into a fourth week.

All four defendants face two counts of honest services fraud, a crime punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

If convicted, Johnson would become the second member of Council, following Bobby Henon, found guilty in a federal bribery case in the last four months.

Testimony is expected to resume Thursday morning.

Keep up with every development in Kenyatta Johnson’s trial with our day-by-day recaps, live daily coverage, and explainer on everything you need to know about the case.