The Nation - News from Aug. 2, 1989

U.S. District Judge Alcee L. Hastings of Miami swore before a Senate impeachment committee that he had nothing to do with a conspiracy to obtain a $150,000 payoff in a Florida racketeering case. “No, sir,” Hastings answered when asked by attorney Terence Anderson if he had ever participated in such a scheme. Hastings, 52, the first black federal judge in Florida history, is accused of plotting to obtain the bribe, of lying about it to the 1983 jury that acquitted him and of an unrelated count of improperly disclosing information obtained from a federal wiretap. Impeached by the House last year, he is now before a 12-member panel gathering evidence before the whole Senate votes on whether to remove him from the bench and deprive him of his $89,500 annual salary.