Sizemore not liable for $2.5 million, court says

SALEM, Ore. (AP) - Anti-tax activist Bill Sizemore won a legal victory Wednesday when a state appeals court said he is not personally liable for a $2.5 million racketeering judgment that teacher unions won against his groups in 2002.

In October, the Oregon Court of Appeals said Sizemore and his groups engaged in fraud and racketeering to strain the unions financially by getting them to spend millions of dollars to fight a pair of anti-union ballot measures in November 2000.

At the time, the state's lawyers said it appeared Sizemore was personally liable for most of the $2.5 million racketeering judgment the unions won against him and his now-defunct group, Oregon Taxpayers United.

But ruling in a related case Wednesday, the Court of Appeals took the opportunity to clarify the October decision by saying Sizemore is not personally liable for the money.

Sizemore, once Oregon's most prolific initiative author, called Wednesday's court decision a blow to the unions.

"All they are after is to get me out of politics," Sizemore said.

Greg Hartman, a lawyer who represents Oregon Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers, said Sizemore engaged in significant misconduct in the initiative campaigns and that the unions will keep pressing their legal case.

"Bill is not off the hook," Hartman said. "We will pursue other claims for personal liability against him."

In its October ruling, the appeals court overturned one finding by the jury that Sizemore's organizations had engaged in racketeering in connection with falsifying financial statements that are required from state charitable organizations and political action committees.

But it upheld the jury's findings related to forged petition signatures, which the state attorney general's office said at the time meant that Sizemore was personally liable for most of the $2.5 million judgment.

Sizemore and his lawyer had insisted after the court's October ruling that the court had upheld most of the $2.5 million judgment against Oregon Taxpayer United organizations, not Sizemore personally.

Sizemore said Wednesday that he intends to remain politically active, and that he's already circulating several initiative measures for the 2008 ballot.

In last month's election, Sizemore was chief sponsor of a measure that would have barred insurance companies from using credit ratings in calculating premiums or rates. The measure was rejected by voters.

He also championed a property-tax cut that voters passed in 1996. At his peak in 2000, he helped qualify seven measures for the statewide ballot.

(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)