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Links between Fumo and Carter are more than just indictments

One was a South Philly pol. The other, a patrician. But they both loved expensive things, and they both stuck the Independence Seaport Museum with the tab, federal prosecutors allege.

One was a South Philly pol. The other, a patrician.

But they both loved expensive things, and they both stuck the Independence Seaport Museum with the tab, federal prosecutors allege.

Now State Sen. Vincent J. Fumo and John S. Carter face separate charges of ripping off the nonprofit museum where Carter spent 17 years as a highly paid president.

For most of those years, Fumo was a museum board member and chief benefactor in Harrisburg, helping to steer millions in public money to the museum.

Fumo cruised free of charge on the museum's yachts during his annual summer vacations in New England. Prosecutors say the trips, worth more than $100,000, amounted to a fraud against the museum.

For his part, the government says, Carter used the museum's yachting account as a way to conceal spending on himself.

Carter's lawyer, Mark E. Cedrone, said yesterday his client would plead guilty.

It appears, though, that Carter will not appear as a witness at Fumo's trial. The unusual length of the government's filing against Carter - 54 pages to detail three charges - is a good sign that prosecutors consider him a criminal who would make a poor witness.

Fumo says he has done nothing wrong and has pledged to vigorously defend himself at trial.

Mark Sheppard, one of Fumo's lawyers, pointed out that the Carter criminal information makes no mention of the Democratic state senator.

"There's no allegation or suggestion in the 54 pages that Sen. Fumo had any knowledge or was in any way involved in any of the alleged wrongdoing by Mr. Carter," Sheppard said.

Though Fumo and Carter do not appear to have been close, they have had a social and professional relationship.

The pair would occasionally dine together in Massachusetts, where Fumo vacationed - and where Carter maintained a house that prosecutors say he rebuilt, landscaped, and lavishly furnished at the museum's expense.

According to a former museum employee familiar with its finances, Carter would charge those meals to the yacht account.

Fumo also once gave Carter a government contract. In 2002, a state Senate fund Fumo controlled paid Carter $11,400 to serve as an expert witness in Fumo's court fight to keep a Civil War museum in Philadelphia.

When The Inquirer first raised questions about seaport museum management and Fumo's cruises in 2004, the museum chairman defended Carter's record and the museum's purchase of a luxury yacht.

"We're happy with what we've done with the museum," M. Walter D'Alessio, who was chairman at the time, said. "We're proud of what we've done with the ship."

D'Alessio also called Fumo "the single largest contributor of public funds" to the museum.

Asked yesterday whether the board had failed at oversight, D'Alessio said that because of the two prosecutions, "I'm not going to talk about it."

In 2005, D'Alessio was replaced by business executive Peter McCausland. It was McCausland who alerted prosecutors to Carter's alleged misdeeds after commissioning an internal audit.

"John Carter is a sad character," McCausland said. "He deceived a lot of people for a very long time."

McCausland has aggressively shaken up the museum, selling its yacht and the house the museum provided for Carter.

"I wish I and the other members of the board . . . had been more vigilant and had uncovered the fraud earlier," he said.

"This whole experience has been a wake-up call for the museum. And I hope it's a wake-up call for all nonprofits," he said.