Finneran tells panel he was not focused on redistricting

Thomas M. Finneran listened during testimony yesterday to a Board of Bar Overseers panel. The board will decide next year whether to disbar or reinstate the former speaker of the House. (WENDY MAEDA/GLOBE STAFF)

Former House speaker Thomas M. Finneran tried to portray himself yesterday as a distracted legislative leader concerned for the state's budget, not someone who obsessed over the details of a redistricting plan that got him into so much legal trouble.

The Mattapan Democrat's license to practice law was suspended when he pleaded guilty in US District Court in Boston earlier this year to one count of obstruction of justice that grew out of a lawsuit by minority activists over a redistricting plan that diluted the political power of minority voters.

Yesterday, Finneran testified before a Board of Bar Overseers panel that some of his actions during the legal controversy were committed at the direction of his House attorney and that he was consumed by budget battles, not redistricting, at the time he was questioned under oath about the redistricting plan.

"We had much more severe issues to deal with," he said of the first year of the Romney administration, when the state budget was $3 billion short. "It was in the rearview mirror."

Finneran, 57, was generally calm while questioned by his lawyers, the second day of the hearing that could lead to his reinstatement or disbarment as a lawyer in Massachusetts. Sometime next year, the three-member panel will recommend to the Board of Bar Overseers what sanction, if any, Finneran should face.

The Supreme Judicial Court has final say on lawyer discipline. Last year, the SJC reduced the suspension for a lawyer who pleaded guilty to violating federal banking laws. The SJC said the lawyer should be suspended for just one year, not the two years the Bar Overseers recommended.

Also yesterday, two Republican lawyers who knew Finneran when they worked on Beacon Hill spoke of his integrity and denounced the federal prosecution.

Leonard Lewin, who was chief legal counsel to former Republican governors Paul Cellucci and Jane Swift from 1999 to 2001, said Finneran was the victim of a political "witch hunt."

Lewin said he tried to persuade US Attorney Michael J. Sullivan, who is also a Republican, not to charge Finneran, because he felt strongly about the Mattapan Democrat's personal integrity.

"You always knew where you stood with Tom," he said. "Tom never lied to you. . . . I just thought there was a witch hunt going on that ought not to be going on."

Mark Robinson - who was once a top US Department of Justice official and a former federal prosecutor, as well as a top official in the Weld administration - said Finneran should not have been charged with a crime.

"I thought it was a tragedy," said Robinson, who also testified that he offered to represent Finneran for free if he went to trial. "I think he's suffered enough."

In January, Finneran pleaded guilty to the single count of obstruction of justice in return for the dismissal of three counts of perjury against him. He was sentenced to 18 months unsupervised probation and promised not to run for office for 5 years.

Finneran now hosts a morning talk show on WRKO-AM and is scheduled to undergo prostate cancer surgery this weekend at Massachusetts General Hospital.