S.C. Speaker of the House Bobby Harrell Indicted – Updated

UPDATED

S.C. Speaker of the House Bobby Harrell was indicted today on nine charges by the Richland County Grand Jury.

The following is a press release from First Circuit Solicitor David Pascoe regarding the action.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Solicitor Pascoe Announces Indictments of

House Speaker Bobby Harrell

Columbia, S.C. – September 10, 2014—  First Circuit Solicitor David Pascoe announces that the Richland County Grand Jury indicted Robert W. Harrell, Jr., Speaker of the South Carolina House of Representatives, today on nine charges.  The nine indictments are for two counts of Misconduct in Office (statutory and common law), six counts of Using Campaign Funds for Personal Use, and one count of False Reporting Candidate Campaign Disclosures.

A bond hearing date has not been set.  Mr. Harrell has been provided copies of his indictments but he will be allowed to formally accept service of the true billed indictments and attend his bond hearing on the same date.  Once the date for service of the indictments and the bond hearing is set, the First Circuit Solicitor’s Office will provide ample notice to the media of the date and time.

Solicitor Pascoe stated, “At this point in the process, the indictments are mere accusations.  Mr. Harrell is presumed innocent until proven guilty.”   Solicitor Pascoe will have no further comment regarding this matter and respectfully requests that the media not contact his office regarding the case against Mr. Harrell.  Any requests for indictments or future filings in this case should be directed to the Richland County Clerk of Court.

Harrell issued the following response late this afternoon:

House Speaker Bobby Harrell issued the following statement:

“I have said all along that I have never intentionally violated any law, and I still strongly believe that statement to be accurate.

“In no way have I ever benefited personally or financially from travel reimbursements from my campaign account. In fact, I have regularly used the privately raised funds from my campaign account to pay for official state travel instead of passing that cost along to taxpayers. Similarly, I have often used my own airplane, at no cost to the taxpayers, for official state travel when it would have been completely justifiable to have used the taxpayer-funded state plane instead. If over the course of four years, I mistakenly wrote down the wrong date on a handful of items, that is something that can easily be addressed.”

Read the full indictment here: harrell indictment