There are former Enron and HealthSouth prosecutors at the government’s table in the insider-trading trial of former Qwest chief executive Joe Nacchio.
But when the government launches its case – as early as today if jury selection is completed – a lesser known prosecutor will make opening arguments.
Colorado native James Hearty, 38, will take center stage in a case he has been working on for nearly five years. Nacchio’s lead attorney, Herbert Stern, is scheduled to deliver the opening statement for the defense.
Hearty has trial experience in private practice, with the Justice Department in Washington and in the government’s failed fraud prosecution of four mid-level Qwest executives in 2004.
If some observers were surprised last week when lead Nacchio prosecutor Cliff Stricklin, who helped convict Enron’s Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling, said Hearty would make opening arguments, those who know Hearty were not.
Hearty has been living and breathing the case since its inception and no one else on the prosecution team has been there longer than a year.
“He knows the facts of the case more intimately than anyone involved in the case right now,” said former U.S. attorney Bill Leone, who hired Hearty.
Added veteran Denver defense attorney Dan Reilly: “It’s an indication that the team has confidence in his ability to do what must be done in the opening, which is to set out the facts clearly and to establish and increase the credibility of the government’s case.”
Hearty and Reilly met in private practice before Hearty went to work for Justice. Until a few years ago they played together in a local lawyer football league. Hearty played tight end at Colorado State University.
“He was so much better than everyone else that he didn’t have to show any wickedness to dominate,” Reilly said of their football games.
“He’s got a very even temperament. That’s going to suit him well in this thing. You don’t win a case with emotion. You win it with facts.”
Staff writer Greg Griffin can be reached at 303-954-1241 or at ggriffin@denverpost.com.
James Hearty
Title: Assistant U.S. attorney; chief, major crimes section
Education: Colorado State University; University of Colorado Law School
Experience: Trial attorney, civil fraud section and office of consumer litigation, 1998-2002
Family: Married, three children
Home: Littleton
