beckett,
I read the NYTimes article you linked to, so as to "check my facts". Sounds to me like yet another story of extensive democratic party corruption. Did I miss something?
Probably the only reason this even became a case at all, and made the news, was that Cherokee didn't pay-off these unnamed: "environmental activists" the article mentions, along with everyone else in the state.
Lesson learned for Darden: never piss off environmental activists!