[Many Others]

oh they're all just swell folks - maybe have missed it but have heard no mention of this, even involves the bizaare 2008 Breeders Cup runaway juror twist

If it weren't for the plea deal that his dad, former Veco chief executive Bill Allen, made with federal prosecutors, Mark Allen might not have been in the winner's circle Saturday at the Kentucky Derby, celebrating the victory of his thoroughbred Mine That Bird and a $2 million purse.

Bill Allen, in pleading guilty in 2007 to three counts related to his central role in the Alaska public corruption scandal, won immunity from federal criminal charges for Mark Allen.

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Mine That Bird indirectly figured into one of the strangest events in the Stevens trial. After the jurors began deliberating, one of them, Marian Hinnant, suddenly skipped town. Initially she told the judge her father had died, but then admitted she had a ticket to see the Breeders Cup, a major thoroughbred stakes race Santa Anita Park near Los Angeles.

http://http://www.adn.com/news/politics/veco/story/781355.html