DALLAS — A former aide to George W. Bush’s media adviser has agreed to plead guilty to mail fraud and perjury, admitting she stole and mailed a Bush debate videotape to Al Gore’s campaign and lied about it to a grand jury.
Under the deal she reached with federal prosecutors, Juanita Yvette Lozano, 31, faces a $200 fine and prison sentence of between six months and a year, The Dallas Morning News reported on its Web site Friday.
Lozano admitted guilt in a statement that she and her lawyer signed and dated Wednesday, according to court documents.
In exchange for her plea, the government is dropping one count of the three-count indictment, the accusation that Lozano lied to the FBI during the investigation.
No date has been set for her to enter her plea. A judge has the option of allowing her to serve her time at home or in a halfway house.
Lozano worked for Maverick Media, formed by a top Bush media adviser, Mark McKinnon, to develop Bush’s political ads.
In September, a Bush videotape, strategy book and other papers taken from Maverick Media were sent to former U.S. Rep. Tom Downey, D-N.Y., who was advising Gore before the first presidential debate with Bush.
Downey gave the materials to the FBI, and agents later identified Lozano as a suspect, based on surveillance videotape from an Austin post office.
Lozano, a Democratic county precinct chair, said she used her home computer to look up Downey’s address on the Internet before sending him a package promising further help.
FBI agents found a record of that address search on her hard drive, and her subsequent denial of that to a grand jury was the basis of the perjury charge.
The Gore campaign has steadfastly denied any role in the mailing.
McKinnon, whose lawyer says he is not under suspicion, said he is at a loss to explain the betrayal.
”It put the campaign at risk, and it put me through hell,” he said. “We’re talking about a race that was won by fewer than 500 votes. If Tom Downey had been any less honorable of a person, we could have been talking about President Gore.”
