Ex-aide: Cash went into my dream home

Associated Press

GREENSBORO, N.C.

John Edwards’ ex-aide acknowledged Thursday that much of nearly $1 million in campaign supporters’ cash went to build his North Carolina dream house, not to buy the silence of the presidential candidate’s pregnant mistress.

Young testified for a fourth-straight day at Edwards’ campaign- finance fraud trial, peppered with questions from Edwards attorney Abbe Lowell about the money from two donors that flowed into personal accounts controlled by Young and his wife.

Young has said he took secret payments from wealthy donors at Edwards’ direction to help conceal the presidential contender’s affair with Rielle Hunter and keep his 2008 presidential campaign viable.

Young said the checks secretly provided by a then-96-year-old heiress were mixed with the couple’s other funds as they built their $1.5 million hilltop house on 10 acres near Chapel Hill, N.C. Young often deferred questions on the payments to his wife, Cheri, saying “my wife is the one who handles the finances in our family.”

Young’s testimony is considered key to the prosecution’s case that while campaigning for the White House, Edwards directed a scheme to use the money from the heiress and a Texas lawyer to conceal his affair with Hunter.

Young initially claimed he was the father of Hunter’s daughter and took her into his home with his wife.