There's a pic of Marion Brooks on this web site as well...she used to be a TV anchor in Atlanta.
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http://www.ajc.com/news/content/metro/atlanta/stories/0209metcamp.html
Campbell paid cash for vacations, gifts, TV anchor testifies
By JEFFRY SCOTT, BETH WARREN
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 02/09/06
Former Atlanta TV news anchor Marion Brooks glanced over at jurors, the court security officer and the crowd. She looked at seemingly everyone but the man she had a hidden four-year affair with ? former Atlanta Mayor Bill Campbell.
Brooks didn't tear up, but she also didn't look happy to be back in Atlanta on Wednesday taking the witness stand against her former lover. She never called him by name, instead referring to Campbell as "him" or "the former mayor." Federal prosecutor Russell Vineyard, who avoided dredging up any details, asked if Brooks and the mayor took steps to keep their relationship secret. "Absolutely," Brooks said. "I would have him come to my apartment and we would meet out of town."
For more than two weeks, prosecutors have been trying to show a pattern of cash spending by the former mayor, who is accused of shaking down contractors. So they didn't ask Brooks about the titillating details of the affair. Instead they honed in on the cash Campbell allegedly used to fund their fling.
Her testimony, just about 40 minutes long, briefly shifted the tone of the trial from tedious details on bank records to romance. The pair took dozens of trips to romantic locales from Mexico to Paris to San Francisco to Jamaica, Campbell paying for hotels and meals with cash, and arranging airfare through his friend and poker buddy, Gabe Pascarella. Brooks said she used her credit card for their airfare to Mexico and her ticket to Paris, but the mayor paid for the other flights ? in cash. He also paid for hotel stays, food and entertainment and always plunked down cash, she said.
Defense attorneys claim Campbell sometimes used cash because he had gambling earnings on hand.
Not so, according to Brooks. "He said almost all the time he broke even," she testified.
Brooks testified that Campbell paid for her flights to their rendezvous to a dozen cities, including several return trips to Miami, New York and Washington. Campbell also whisked her away to romantic getaways to Los Angeles; Charleston, S.C.; Lake Tahoe, Calif.; Las Vegas; Chicago; San Antonio, Texas; Memphis; and Raleigh, the mayor's hometown.
In spring 1997, the two met at a resort in Jamaica, where they vacationed with mutual friend and radio host Tom Houck, Brooks said. The WSB anchor testified that she first met Campbell in 1996 at a birthday party for Houck, whom she befriended after college while the two worked at WGST radio.
"This was very hard for her," Houck said of her testimony. "She's an honorable person."
He said she wouldn't want to say anything to harm Campbell, but was subpoenaed to testify.
"I think she found herself in a position she certainly wouldn't want to be in," Houck said.
For a few minutes, sitting in the courtroom felt a bit like watching a slide show of somebody's honeymoon, as photos taken from Campbell and Brooks' July 1999 trip to Paris were projected on a screen. Former Atlanta Chief Operating Officer Larry Wallace joined them on the trip. The trio stayed for four days at the Bristol Hotel, which Brooks described as: "Very nice, top of the line."
They spent hours a day sightseeing, all of it paid for in cash by Campbell, testified Brooks, who took photographs of the trip. In one shot, Campbell is standing in front of the Arc de Triomphe; in another he is in front of a cafe, wearing a cap and sunglasses and a knit shirt. She said Campbell, as he frequently did, bought her gifts: "He bought me a couple of watercolors from street vendors," she said while looking straight ahead.
Prosecutors allege that United Water ? which had a $21 million a year contract to privatize the city's water supply ? paid about $12,000 of the expenses of the Paris trip. They claim the trip was kept secret, and never appeared on Campbell's personal calendar.
Campbell, who insists he is innocent, smiled and watched Brooks during her testimony just as he has done with all witnesses. His wife, Sharon, has attended all of jury selection and most of the trial but did not come to court Wednesday.
Brooks testified she usually saw Campbell twice a week and their affair continued after she moved to Chicago in December 1997. Campbell sometimes flew to see her in Chicago and would pay to fly her back to Atlanta and put her up at a local hotel, she said. The couple continued their trysts from 1996 to 1999, and briefly rekindled their romance in 2001, Brooks said.
During a brief cross-examination, the defense did not contest the fact of the relationship.
Brooks told jurors that Campbell lent her money for a down payment on a Chicago condominium, handing her $16,000 in cash.
She testified that Campbell told her "he borrowed the [$16,000] from Gabe Pascarella." She said she paid back the money to Pascarella, who is a Campbell friend and testified earlier that he made travel arrangements for Campbell and was a regular in their Friday night poker games.
And there were expensive gifts; a bracelet worth between $800 and $1,000, along with a watch, two necklaces, trinkets and, on their last excursion, their second jaunt to San Francisco, the mayor bought her a nice parting gift ? a $2,400 coat. With that trip in 2001, Brooks said, she and Campbell ended their relationship amicably. "I think Marion was at the point that she was over it," Houck said. "I think Marion wanted to get married and she knew that wasn't possible with Bill.
"I think Bill loves Sharon. That's his pride and joy."
Brooks testified that only Houck, key government witness Dewey Clark and a couple of others close to Campbell knew she and the mayor were having an affair.
