Ex-superintendent thought God sent him to Macon ‘to be our Moses,’ defense witness says

Lawyers for two men on trial for allegedly scheming to bribe the superintendent of Bibb County’s public schools continued their efforts on Friday to refute prosecutors’ accusations of their clients’ underhand dealings in the form of kickbacks and money laundering.

Defense attorneys for the accused — Macon businessman Cliffard D. Whitby and prominent Tallahassee, Florida, lawyer Harold M. Knowles — called to the witness stand business associates, clergymen and others.

The defense lawyers in the now-two-week-old trial, in trying to impugn the credibility of the government’s star witness — ex-schools superintendent Romain Dallemand — called to the stand witnesses whose recollections of events in question differed from Dallemand’s.

Notable was the testimony of Cory McFarlane, one of Knowles’ former associates in Knowles’ Pinnacle construction company. Dallemand testified last week that around the time Pinnacle sold Bibb schools a software package for $3.25 million in late 2012, he met McFarlane, Whitby and Knowles in south Georgia to discuss “how much” in kickbacks “each one of us had coming.”

Dallemand said the four men placed their cellphones in one car and then rode around in another car to talk. “There were,” Dallemand testified, “trust issues.”

But on Friday, McFarlane, described as a “chief visionary” of Knowles’ company, disputed that. McFarlane, who is not charged in the case, said there was no such meeting.

The defense’s aim, at least in part, is to cast Dallemand as a scamster out to bamboozle the school district and locals alike, in essence conning them into investing in dubious humanitarian and educational endeavors, as well as financial undertakings both here and in his native Haiti.

Dallemand, who has pleaded guilty to a tax crime in exchange for testifying about the alleged bribery, admitted on the stand to being a liar — to the people and children of the county and to his family. However, he said was being truthful in his account of how the supposed bribe scheme played out.

He also said alleged payoffs that Whitby and Knowles are accused of funneling into his bank accounts were not funds for investments, as defense attorneys have at times suggested.

The Rev. Bryant Raines said Dallemand, whose two-year tenure as schools chief ended in 2013, had sought investors for educational endeavors in Haiti and other ventures as early as 2012.

Raines, who is pastor of New Pilgrim Missionary Baptist Church, said when Dallemand took office in early 2011, the superintendent seemed to be here to do good.

In hindsight, Raines said Dallemand “really raped our school system. ... He’s manipulated everybody around here.”

Another defense witness, the Rev. James Baker of New Beginning Missionary Baptist Church, said he was close to Dallemand and became something of a spiritual adviser for him.

Baker also told of Dallemand’s hunt for investors in business ventures and said Dallemand once asked him for $5,000.

Baker said Dallemand, known for his ego and beyond-pushy management style, sometimes spoke of himself in Biblical terms. Baker remembered Dallemand saying, “I just believe God sent me here to be our Moses.”

“I said, ‘Lord, Jesus,’ ” Baker recalled Friday as the courtroom erupted in laughter.

Whitby, 56, and Knowles, 71, are jointly accused, among other crimes, of conspiring to bribe Dallemand, paying him a $100,000 bribe and conspiring to launder money.

It remains to be seen whether Whitby or Knowles will testify.

Individually, Whitby, a developer and former chairman of the Macon-Bibb County Industrial Authority, is accused of paying Dallemand bribes in the form of a cash payment and five checks totaling $358,000 between the summer of 2013 and early 2017.

Knowles, a construction-firm owner and prominent attorney in north Florida, also is charged with offering Dallemand a bribe in the form of ownership in Knowles’ building firm in exchange for contracts with the Bibb school system.

Testimony, which resumes Monday at 8 a.m., may end sometime around the middle of next week.

This story was originally published October 5, 2018 at 4:27 PM.