The criminal trial of a Hamilton County Commissioner charged with extortion begins today.
Tim Boyd faces a Class D felony, which carries a sentence of two to four years in prison upon conviction, in connection with phone conversations he had with East Ridge Mayor Brent Lambert in February.
At the time, Boyd and Lambert were campaign opponents for the District 8 seat in Hamilton County. While under indictment, Boyd soundly defeated Lambert in that May election.
Lambert said Boyd threatened during three phone calls in February to release negative information about him – unless Lambert dropped out of the race. Lambert said he recorded their first conversation on Feb. 16 to have a witness. Then he went to Hamilton County District Attorney General Neal Pinkston with his complaint and recorded two more phone calls he made to Boyd.
According to documents he provided to the Times Free Press, Pinkston asked the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation to look into possible extortion, which is defined under the criminal code as trying to gain an unlawful advantage or immunity. Pinkston’s office then secured an indictment against Boyd in early April, the day before early voting started in the May 1 primary.
Boyd has said the prosecution is a political setup, and his lawyer, Lee Davis, has argued the discussions are protected political speech.
In previous hearings, Davis said Boyd referred to information already contained in the public record about campaign contributions Lambert received in 2017 from local developers – just days after the East Ridge City Council approved more than $4 million in infrastructure improvements for a project they were involved in. At the time, Lambert hadn’t had a campaign going since 2014.
Davis said the case should be dismissed, cautioning that politicians will rush to their district attorney’s office in future elections to get an indictment against their opponents.
But Pinkston said there’s a clear dispute about whether Boyd’s statements are political speech or genuinely extortion.
A special judge, Andrew Freiberg, of Bradley County, Tenn., said he didn’t want to dismiss the case until a jury hears the facts.
Attorneys will begin selecting them at 9 a.m. From there, both sides will give opening statements and Pinkston will begin presenting the state’s case. The trial is expected to last two days.
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