James Traficant, convicted ex-congressman, dies

CLEVELAND, OH -- James Traficant, the colorful Ohio politician whose conviction for taking bribes and kickbacks made him only the second person to be expelled from Congress since the Civil War, died Saturday. He was 73.

Traficant was seriously injured Tuesday after a vintage tractor flipped over on him as he tried to park it inside a barn on the family farm near Youngstown. He died four days later in the hospital, said Dave Betras, chairman of the Mahoning County Democratic Party.

The Democrat's expulsion from Congress in 2002 came three months after a federal jury in Cleveland convicted him. Prosecutors said he used his office to extract bribes from businesspeople and coerced staffers to work on his farm and his house boat on the Potomac River in Washington. He also was charged with witness tampering, destroying evidence and filing false tax returns. He spent seven years in prison.

Traficant's notoriety was rivaled only by his eccentricity.

He loved to play the buffoon during his 17 years in Congress. He got plenty of notice within the staid, buttoned-down Capitol and airtime on C-SPAN for his messy mop of hair - revealed to be a wig when he went to prison - his typical wardrobe of cowboy boots, denim or polyester suits, and his bombastic speaking style.

His made-for-TV rants on the House floor invariably ended with the signoff "Beam me up," which Traficant borrowed from "Star Trek" to show his disgust or bemusement at whatever he found particularly outrageous.

He was born May 8, 1941, in Youngstown and was a quarterback for the University of Pittsburgh, where he played with future NFL coaches Mike Ditka and Marty Schottenheimer.

He worked as a drug counselor for 10 years before running for Mahoning County sheriff at a colleague's suggestion.

He endeared himself to voters in the early 1980s by defying the courts and going to jail for three nights rather than foreclose on the homes of workers laid off from the city's dying steel industry.

The antagonism between Traficant and federal law enforcement authorities lasted throughout his public career, with Traficant trumpeting it as proof that he was on the side of "the little guy" against powerful government interests.

He faced his first federal bribery and corruption trial in 1983, when he was Mahoning County sheriff. Prosecutors accused Traficant of taking bribes to protect mobsters' criminal activity. He defended himself in court, although he was not a lawyer, and won. He argued that he was conducting a one-person sting.

He was elected to Congress the following year and was easily re-elected eight times.