Judge dismisses Kohring’s claims

PALMER — For now at least, and for the first time in at least five years, Vic Kohring appears to have no business pending in state or federal court.

Kohring, who won re-election seven times in Wasilla to the state House of Representatives before he resigned in 2007, was one of six state lawmakers and a handful of lobbyists and businessmen ensnared in the federal government’s investigation into public corruption in Alaska.

In 2007, he was drawn up on criminal charges that, at the conclusion of a long saga and serving time in an out-of-state prison, ended in a no-contest plea.

Along the way, Kohring ended up suing his lawyer, John Henry Browne, over a traffic accident that left Kohring injured and in chronic pain. In a handful of separate cases, various creditors and Mat-Su Regional Medical Center sued Kohring.

Then in June 2011, Kohring sued the star witness in his criminal trial, oilfield services company CEO Bill Allen, for slander, seeking more than $100,000 in damages. He also sued Allen’s former company, VECO, and the company that bought it, CH2MHill.

The various suits between Kohring, his lawyer and his creditors all settled out of court. But the defamation suit against Allen lasted until just last month.

In a ruling filed Sept. 20, U.S. District Court Judge Ralph Beistline makes short work of all of Kohring’s claims as to why he should be allowed to sue Allen given that witnesses are generally immune to that kind of action arising from what they do or say in court.

To Kohring’s contention that the government never granted Allen immunity, Beistline replies that “the law is otherwise.”

Immunity, the judge ruled, is something that doesn’t have to be explicitly offered or granted. It’s a “common law doctrine” that applies in all cases.

“Absolute witness immunity is necessary because without such a protection, the truth-seeking process at trial would be impaired,” Beistline wrote.

It would be impaired, he wrote, because witnesses might not testify truthfully, choosing to shade testimony in favor of a defendant out of fear of a subsequent lawsuit. If someone testifies untruthfully or maliciously, the remedy isn’t a defamation suit, but a criminal case in which the government charges that person with perjury.

Beistline also threw out Kohring’s claim that he was even defamed in the first place.

“A well-known defense to a defamation cause of action is the truthfulness of the alleged libel or slander,” Beistline wrote.

In plainer English — telling the truth about someone doesn’t harm the person’s character any more than it has already been harmed. And, Beistline wrote, Kohring as much admitted the truth of what Allen testified to that while a lawmaker, Kohring accepted money from Allen. To enter that guilty plea, Kohring had to admit he’d conspired to extort a bribe.

Almost immediately after entering that plea, Kohring started telling his story from his own point of view. Since then, a monthly series of 12 first-person columns appeared in the Valley-based Make-A-Scene arts and entertainment magazine and also online. In all of them, Kohring maintains innocence and that he was railroaded by prosecutors he claims were corrupt.

He makes those claims based on his first conviction being overturned after it came to light prosecutors had withheld evidence in the most high-profile of the corruption trials, that of the late former U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens.

Kohring has said that he later pleaded guilty to put the matter to rest and relieve the burdens on his already maxed-out resources.

More recently, Kohring has applied for a seat on the Wasilla Planning Commission. In a letter and application for appointment to mayor Verne Rupright dated Sept. 11, Kohring cites his “knowledge and skills acquired from my years of public service would be of unique benefit to the residents of Wasilla.”

That experience includes a previous stint on the city planning commission from 1991-1994, appointed by then-mayor John Stein.

Contact reporter Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.