Conservative foundations, multinational oil companies and a prescription drug maker were the most frequent sponsors of more than 100 expense-paid educational seminars attended by federal judges over a 4 1/2-year period, according to a Center for Public Integrity investigation.

Among the seminar titles were “The Moral Foundations of Capitalism,” “Corporations and the Limits of Criminal Law” and “Terrorism, Climate & Central Planning: Challenges to Liberty & the Rule of Law.”

Leading the list of sponsors of the 109 seminars identified by the center were the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation, The Searle Freedom Trust, ExxonMobil Corp., Shell Oil Co., pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc. and State Farm Insurance Cos. Each sponsored 54 seminars.

Sponsors pick up the cost of judges’ expenses, which often include air fare, hotel stays and meals. The seminars in the Center’s investigation took place from July 2008 through 2012.

While the sponsorships are generally not considered a direct corrupting influence, they are of concern to some legal ethicists who say they create, at the very least, an appearance of a conflict of interest.

About 11 percent of the more than 1,700 federal judges in the United States reported attending one or more of the seminars over the period, according to disclosure forms reviewed by the Center.

Roughly three-fourths of the more than 800 sponsors listed in documents were individuals, including a number of judges who took trips, raising the possibility that they may have fully or partially offset the cost of the seminars with their donations. Most of the remaining underwriters were companies and foundations.

Determining exactly how much was paid by which sponsor is difficult — amounts are not required to be reported under the disclosure rules.

Two schools — George Mason University, located in Virginia just outside Washington, D.C., and Northwestern University based in Evanston, Ill., — hosted more than two-thirds of the seminars.

In 2011, for example, ExxonMobil reported giving $20,000 to George Mason specifically for its judicial training program. The oil company gave an additional $30,000 to the university’s Law & Economics Center, which hosts the conferences. Between 2003 and 2007, the ExxonMobil Foundation gave the think tank $150,000.

Judicial conferences are billed as educational retreats intended to improve judges’ understanding of the law and economics.

Many of the seminars are sponsored by organizations that back conservative and libertarian causes, especially those hosted by George Mason. But there are a few exceptions. A June 2010 conference titled “Int'l Human Rights and Humanitarian Law: Applications in Nat'l Jurisprudence,” for example, was co-sponsored by the Open Society Institute, a foundation founded by liberal investor George Soros, focused mainly on human rights law.

(The Center for Public Integrity has received funding from Soros’ Open Society Foundations.)

Charles Geyh, an Indiana University law professor who specializes in judicial ethics, is skeptical that rulings are directly influenced by corporate sponsorship of seminars, but noted, “In a cynic’s view that would smack of corruption.”

“Even if it has no effect in terms of the decisions judges make, the perception of influence matters a great deal,” he says. “It looks as if (corporations) are buying influence, even if it’s not true.”

The judges who participated in the most seminars, according to reports filed online by the judges, were U.S. District Judge Charles R. Wolle of the Southern District of Iowa and Chief Judge Thomas B. Bennett of the Northern District of Alabama Bankruptcy Court. Each reported attending nine seminars.

Wolle is a “senior status” judge, meaning he is semi-retired. He did not respond to requests for comment.

Bennett’s response is included below.

The next-most-frequent participants were:

• U.S. District Judge Manuel L. Real of the Central District of California and Judge Diarmuid F. O’Scannlain of the U.S. Court of Appeals 9th Circuit, covering the Western states, who each took eight trips;
• E. Grady Jolly, a federal appeals court judge for the 5th Circuit, which includes Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi, and U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Michael B. Kaplan of the District of New Jersey, who each took six trips.

In an email, Kaplan wrote that the “seminars offer a valuable opportunity for new judicial appointees to enhance their knowledge and skills in complex areas of the law,” including economics. O’Scannlain and Real declined to comment for this story. 

Wolle, Real and O'Scannlain are all listed as seminar sponsors, though records do not indicate how much they contributed.

In April 2009, Jolly traveled to Northwestern University to attend the “Criminalization of Corporate Conduct” seminar sponsored by the American Petroleum Institute, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and 13 other funders.

Last August, Jolly wrote the majority 2-1 opinion declaring that the Environmental Protection Agency broke the law when it rejected a Texas emissions cap generally supported by the fossil fuels industry.

Jolly, who did not respond to requests for comment, sided with two of the petitioners in the suit — the American Petroleum Institute and the U.S. Chamber.

George Mason University’s Law & Economics Center hosted 45 seminars while Northwestern University’s Judicial Education Program hosted 29. The remaining top five conference hosts, including The Sedona Conference and the Foundation for Research on Economics and the Environment (FREE), collectively organized 28 conferences.

Billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, major supporters of conservative causes, and their foundations have given millions to George Mason University. As the Center recently reported, the George Mason University Foundation received $4.4 million in 2011 from the Charles G. Koch Foundation, making up 15 percent of its revenue that year.

Officials from the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation did not return phone calls seeking comment for this report.

The Searle Freedom Trust, a foundation advocating “economic liberty” which regularly donates to conservative groups like the Cato Institute and the American Enterprise Institute, contributed a combined $400,000 to George Mason’s judicial education programs in 2010 and 2011.

Seminars at Northwestern are hosted by the school’s Searle Center on Law, Regulation, and Economic Growth. The think tank, according to its website, was founded in 2006 thanks to a “generous grant” from Daniel C. Searle, the late pharmaceutical industry executive.

In 2009, the Searle foundation gave $200,000 to Northwestern’s Searle Center for its judicial education program.

Records show corporate sponsorship at Northwestern was highest from 2008 through 2010, when Henry Butler — now in charge of George Mason University’s Law & Economics Center — ran the Searle Center.

Daniel Rodriguez, dean of Northwestern University’s School of Law, says corporate sponsorships at the school “ended the moment Butler left." Rodriguez says the school recently decided to terminate the programs. The dean says he's against corporate sponsorship of judicial seminars.

“These programs should be free from any real or perceived conflict of interest,” he says.

Butler, a prominent conservative, spoke at more judicial conferences than any other instructor, records show.

He has taught judicial seminar courses with titles like “Economic Thinking” and “Economics of Insurance.” A former Republican candidate for Congress — he lost a 1992 bid — Butler was a “Koch Distinguished Professor of Law and Economics” at the University of Kansas.

Butler declined to be interviewed for this story. Daniel Polsby, dean of the George Mason University School of Law, also declined to answer questions, but did say: “We're very proud of the activities and programs of the Law & Economics Center” via email.

One frequent attendee of George Mason’s judicial seminars, Judge Bennett of Alabama bankruptcy court, told the Center “I’m not going to be snowed by anybody’s presentation.” He said he finds the seminars “infinitely invaluable.”

“You can accumulate information much more quickly than if you sit in your office and read stuff,” he says.

John Dunbar contributed to this report.

The Center for Public Integrity is a nonprofit, independent investigative news outlet. To read more on this issue, please visit publicintegrity.org.

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Courtesy of Chris Perkins

Chris Perkins is a former U.S. Marine who served in Iraq until 2006. His battalion suffered heavy casualties.

At job fairs this summer from Denver to Colorado Springs, retired Army sergeant Thomas Maretich always bumps into the usual suspects and an all-too-familiar gaze of frustration — as if he’s staring into a mirror.

“I keep seeing the same people — mostly veterans — and I’m talking about captains, people with college degrees. They’ve been all over the world, have all kinds of experience. But it’s just the same guys over and over,” said Maretich, who in June earned a medical retirement from the Army.

“There are just a handful of jobs and thousands of veterans lined up for them. How are you supposed to get a job?” asked Maretich, a Colorado Springs resident with more than 20 years of Army experience. “Our veteran numbers are growing and jobs aren’t growing fast enough. It’s a real problem.”

Yet amid the listless hiring rates of a slack economy, men and women with combat experience are being purposely ignored by some employers who fear they may have the symptoms of  post-traumatic stress disorder, thus making them — in their view — risky candidates, said John E. Pickens III, executive director of VeteransPlus.

“While it’s good that employers and general public understand (PTSD) issues, there may be some employers who know just enough to be reluctant, and who say: I want to hire this guy but I don’t want this guy having his war experiences affect his work,” Pickens said. His nonprofit has offered financial counseling to more than 150,000 current and former service members. 

“Some of the folks we talk to say they feel a little bit conspicuous. Employers are even reluctant to talk to them about their military experiences,” added Pickens, a former combat medic. “While eventually transitioning (into corporate jobs), their co-workers become aware that this is a veteran, and the veteran feels scrutinized to the point where it's like: ‘Are you OK?’ "

Through his consultations with veterans over myriad money issues, Pickens said he has learned that some have opted not to seek treatment for PTSD symptoms at Veterans Affairs hospitals exactly because “they don’t want to be labeled or stigmatized” in their civilian jobs — or while trying to land one.

Related: Opera about Iraq war reaches out to veterans
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“It’s like nobody wants to hire anybody with PTSD,” Maretich said. “It’s ridiculous. The whole thing got a bad name.”

On his final mission in Iraq on Aug. 27, 2009 — during his fourth tour in a war zone — sergeant first class Maretich was stationed as the gunner atop an Army vehicle. A car approached, driven by “a kid,” he recalled. After Maretich determined the vehicle was an imminent threat, he shot and killed the driver, he said. The car, loaded with an estimated 500 pounds of explosives, nonetheless detonated, causing Maretich to suffer a traumatic brain injury, sleep problems, chronic back pain and a knee that required replacement.

Related: 'Got Your 6' campaign helps vets return to civilian life

He also was diagnosed with PTSD — now, be believes, an unmentioned roadblock to his hopes for a corporate job due to its attached stigma.

The irony, he added, is that his duties in Iraq — including in operational intelligence and serving as a combat advisor to Iraqi soldiers — make him an ideal contender for a stateside job.

“I don’t think there is better job training anywhere,” he said. “I’m pretty sure that if I can get an Iraqi soldier to do what we’re training him to do — in a different language and a different culture — I can handle any kind of training job in America where the people speak the same language.”

Some companies, including New York-based financial giant Citi, have recognized that service members who have weathered combat carry unique talents into the boardroom. Last year, Citi hired 700 veterans and this year the company plans to hire at least 1,000 more, said Citi spokesman David Roskin.

Courtesy of Chris Perkins

Former U.S. Marine Chris Perkins has successfully moved from the lethal streets of Iraq to the fierce ways of Wall Street.

Former U.S. Marine Chris Perkins has maneuvered from lethal hot spots in Iraq to a high-pressure job on Wall Street. He exited the Marine Corps in 2006 and immediately recognized, he said, the same talents that fuel success in Manhattan’s hard-charging financial district are not dissimilar from the skills that helped Perkins thrive while serving in Ar Ramadi, the capital of the Al Anbar Province.

Related: Mortgage woes afflict high rate of active troops, veterans

“My job over there was to make very timely and accurate, quantitative decisions with the understanding of risk and risk managements,” said Perkins, now managing director and global head of OTC derivatives intermediation and clearing for Citi. He recalled one frightening moment — delivering bicycles to an Iraqi school then being pinned down by insurgent gunfire five minutes later and about one block away.

Over time, 260 Marines were wounded within his battalion of 1,000 and 16 were killed in action.

Courtesy of Citi

Today, Perkins is an executive with Citi but also helping other veterans ease into the corporate workforce.

“When I was able to navigate into the financial services sector, I asked: ‘Hey, you guys are traders, right? Isn’t that what you’re doing? Aren’t you making quantitative decisions all day long while understanding the risks you are taking?’

"The successful traders said, ‘Yes, that’s exactly we’re doing.’ So I was able to transfer my skills into that job,” said Perkins, who later founded the Citi Military Veterans Network and played a leading role in working with fellow veterans within the financial services industry to co-found Veterans on Wall Street.

Veterans who apply for corporate gigs should carry not a stigma, Perkins said, but a stamp of approval: they’re wired to work long hours with minimal sleep, start early, complete assigned tasks — all with a certain intensity and focus that only can be sharpened by battle experience.

But maybe too many hiring managers and human resources honchos “have just seen too many ‘Rambo’ movies,” Maretich speculated. “Maybe they think we’re all going to come back and not be productive.

“Believe me, man, if I could go out there and swing a hammer, I would. I can’t anymore. The one thing I can do is work in a corporate environment,” he added. “And the thing is, I’ve been really training to do that for years.

“In the civilian world, it’s not life and death. You’re not working 12 hours a day 7 days a week. You’re not worried whether your next decision is going to get everybody killed when they go out there. The corporate world would actually be a lot easier.” 

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Gary Cameron / Reuters

Occupy Congress protesters march to the west side of the U.S. Capitol for a rallly on Tuesday.

Thousands of Occupy protesters from across the country are expected to converge Tuesday on Capitol Hill to take their message to the halls of Congress, in what some observers say is the movement’s overdue moment to engage the American political system.

Protesters already have set up camps in public spaces, taken over foreclosed homes and  shut down key shipping ports, but for the most part they have shunned the political system, viewing it as beyond salvation.

The congressional protest – which falls on the movement's four-month mark and the beginning of a new session of Congress – appears to represent a strategic shift aimed at winning support of the many Americans disillusioned with the legislative branch.

“Often the complaint that I hear is that, 'you guys are targeting the wrong people.' And so we have that discussion about you know whether or not Wall Street is the source of the problem or really Congress is," said Aaron Bornstein, a 31-year-old neuroscientist and member of the Occupy Wall Street Think Tank, which will hold discussions at the event.

“They're really two sides of the same coin,” he continued. ”You can't have the corruptive influence without both the people who are doing the corrupting and the people who are corrupted.”

Protesters have traveled from far-flung towns and cities such as Walla Walla, Wash., Greensboro, N.C., and San Diego by plane, car, bus and train. They have made posters and information cards – some about controversial legislation, such as the National Defense Authorization Act and the online piracy bills, SOPA and PIPA; and the voting records of members of Congress as well as their net worth. Some intend to camp at one of the two Occupy sites in D.C.

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"Most of the people in our group ... are Social Security folks," said Norm Osterman, a 68-year-old retired teacher from Walla Walla. He said the important issues for him and his fellow retirees are saving Medicare, taxing the rich and ending corporate personhood. "So we’ve seen things come and go. And going to D.C. to complain seems like the only sane thing to do right now."

"Like I say, if people are coming from Walla Walla, they're probably coming from everywhere," quipped Osterman, adding that many residents of his eastern Washington city are supportive of their group called Rebuild the American Dream since students had already taken the Occupy Walla Walla moniker.

A Gallup poll in mid-November showed congressional job approval hovering at 13 percent and the firm noted it was "low among all Americans, regardless of their political party identification." Gallup noted that 2011 was on "track to be the lowest annual rating of Congress in Gallup's history."

'American as apple pie'
Vietnam veteran and retired fine arts professor James A. Davies II is part of a Greensboro group that chartered a bus for the six-hour journey to the nation’s capital. For him, it's imperative to have his "boots on the ground" to protect his children's future and the right to protest, which he said "is as American as apple pie."

“I have to do something to let it be known that there are things in this country that are happening that are wrong and that are contrary to what I grew up believing this country represented," said Davies, 66, noting his grievances include the militarization of the police, suppression of freedom of speech and concerns about "corporate fascism."

The Greensboro group, like others, will meet with their local members of Congress. The day will include a protest march past the three branches of government; a general assembly; teach-ins; a D.C. voting rights vigil, trainings, performances at an 'open mic' stage and a party. Some protesters plan to stay through the weekend so they can march against the landmark Supreme Court decision affirming corporate personhood and money as speech – known as Citizens United – on its second anniversary on Saturday.

• PhotoBlog, December 6: Demonstrators from 46 states 'Take Back the Capitol'

Dorian Warren, an assistant professor of political science at Columbia University, said the twin events will tie their core concern about what the protesters consider Wall Street greed to its impact on the political system.

“This is actually the second prong of their (Occupy) critique," he said. "It’s kind of a smart move to now make their next big event at the site of their second core critique of our democracy, so I think a lot of people will be paying attention."

The event has raised questions about whether Occupy is becoming politicized, especially with an event focused on politicians. But some of those helping put together the day dismiss that idea.

“Our main message is that our elected officials are no longer representing the people and that’s largely due to corporate money running the show on the Hill,” said Mario Lozada, a 25-year-old immigration lawyer from Philadelphia. “The question as to whether or not Occupy Wall Street is becoming politicized -- the answer is ‘absolutely no.’ We’re not supporting any candidate at all."

Embrace party politics?
In some parts of the country, however, Occupy protesters are engaging in the political process.

In parts of Florida, Occupy protesters want to work with Democrats to introduce legislation, according to Deana Rohlinger, an associate professor of sociology at Florida State University researching the Tea Party and Occupy. Protesters in Portland, Ore., also recently claimed credit for helping the City Council craft a resolution supporting the end of corporate personhood.

"The movement is creeping up on this really critical moment in its history because they're going to have to decide whether or not to embrace party politics in some ways, and this is really contentious," she said. "The movement wants to maintain its strength and some activists would see this as being extraordinarily hypocritical, to work within a political system that has been corrupted by the money of corporate America."

"But there are a lot of activists that really believe that despite the flaws of the system, the only way that you can begin to create meaningful, lasting change is to figure out ways in which you can work within the system," she added.

Chris McKay, a 44-year-old auto glass installer in San Diego who left his job to participate in Occupy fulltime, believes the movement will begin to focus on politics over the course of the year. But he noted the changes that have already occurred.

"We're four months old, we're learning, we're adjusting, we're growing," he said. Before Occupy, people may have said, "’I'm one person, what can I do?’ Now, I think Americans are starting to think I am one person, but I can do something."

Courtesy of James Davies

In this handout image, James Davies participates in Occupy Greensboro.

"I'm excited about the occupation going and doing this," he said about Tuesday's event, before leaving on a cross-country bus trip. "I think it's needed to make a statement that 2012 is the Occupy year. This is the year the Occupy movement really will gain the credibility that it needs."