Aide Says She Concealed Job as Fund-Raiser : Courts: Former worker for Assembly Republican Caucus testifies in state Sen. Frank Hill’s corruption trial. She says her duties included targeting firms with pending legislation.

A former Assembly Republican aide testified Wednesday at the corruption trial of state Sen. Frank Hill that GOP legislators were consumed with raising campaign funds from industries with proposals pending in the Legislature.

Making her first appearance at the trial, Karin L. Watson, the star witness against Hill, provided a glimpse inside the inner workings of the Assembly Republican Caucus when then-GOP Leader Pat Nolan of Glendale believed he was on the verge of taking control of the lower house from Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco).

Watson, 47, said that in early 1987 she and other so-called special consultants to the caucus became worried when Nolan requested that they prepare a memo describing their job duties and give it to one of his top lieutenants, Assemblyman Ross Johnson (R-La Habra).

“There was a public version about what our job was and a private version about what our job was,” Watson told jurors in the U.S. District Court trial, describing how she worried about disclosing the true nature of her job.

“We were aware it was illegal to fund-raise on state time,” Watson said. “And that’s exactly what we were doing and we didn’t want to put it on paper.” Her job included identifying “silver bullet” legislation crucial to potential campaign contributors.

Still, she said, she prepared the memo, which included a section about fund raising.

Watson, who joined the caucus staff in 1985, said Hill knew of the fund-raising duties of special consultants because he had “specifically brought in two people” to do the same thing.

“He was fully aware of what we were doing,” said Watson, addressing jurors in a deliberate manner during her 40 minutes of testimony that began late in the day.

Hill is charged with three counts of extortion, money laundering and conspiracy related to an elaborate FBI sting operation. Also standing trial is former legislative aide Terry E. Frost.

Watson agreed to cooperate with prosecutors and testify against Hill and Frost in exchange for a government recommendation that she serve a six-month sentence in a halfway house. She is awaiting sentencing after pleading guilty to extortion.

Watson said she gave her job memo to Richard Temple, then the caucus chief of staff, who forwarded it to Johnson.

Johnson, who was attending the trial, told reporters he had urged Nolan to have job descriptions prepared. However, he denied seeing Watson’s memo until prosecutors showed it to him after the corruption investigation became public in 1988.

“I never saw it. Absolutely not,” said Johnson, adding that the caucus staff was not involved in campaign fund raising.

But in her testimony, Watson emphasized that one of her duties was to identify the silver bullet bills, which she described as legislation that might have meant “life or death” to an industry and thus were ripe for campaign fund-raising solicitations.

Watson said Nolan had grown tired of business groups taking Republicans for granted, believing the GOP did not need campaign contributions to side with industry.

In fact, Watson said, she was instructed at some points to lie to potential donors and say that Republican legislators “(weren’t) that thrilled” about proposed legislation as a way to raise money. Watson will resume testifying Thursday.

Earlier this year, Nolan pleaded guilty to corruption charges and he is serving a federal prison sentence.