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Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid collected a $1.1 million windfall on a Las Vegas land sale even though he hadn’t owned the property for three years, property deeds show.
The Nevada Democrat’s deal was engineered by Jay Brown, a longtime friend and former casino lawyer whose name surfaced in a political bribery trial this summer and in previous organized-crime investigations. He has never been charged with wrongdoing — except for a 1981 federal securities complaint that was settled out of court.

Land deeds obtained by The Associated Press show:

• The deal began in 1998 when Reid bought undeveloped residential property on Las Vegas’ booming outskirts for about $400,000. Reid bought one lot outright and a second parcel jointly with Brown.

• In 2001, Reid sold the land for the same price to a limited-liability corporation created by Brown. The senator did not disclose the sale on his annual public ethics report or tell Congress that he had a stake in Brown’s company. He continued to report to Congress that he personally owned the land.

• After getting local officials to rezone the property for a shopping center, Brown’s company sold the land in 2004 to other developers, and Reid took $1.1 million of the proceeds, nearly tripling his investment. Reid reported it to Congress as a personal land sale.

The complex dealings allowed Reid to transfer ownership, legal liability and some tax consequences to Brown’s company without public knowledge but still collect a seven-figure payoff nearly three years later.

Senate Democratic Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.) accepted free ringside tickets from the Nevada Athletic Commission to three professional boxing matches while that state agency was trying to influence him on federal regulation of boxing.

Reid took the free seats for Las Vegas fights between 2003 and 2005 as he was pressing legislation to increase government oversight of the sport, including the creation of a federal boxing commission that Nevada's agency feared might usurp its authority.

He defended the gifts, saying that they would never influence his position on the bill and he was simply trying to learn how his legislation might affect an important home state industry. "Anyone from Nevada would say I'm glad he is there taking care of the state's number one businesses," he said. "I love the fights anyways, so it wasn't like being punished," added the senator, a former boxer and boxing judge.

Senate ethics rules generally allow lawmakers to accept gifts from federal, state or local governments, but specifically warn against taking such gifts — particularly on multiple occasions — when they might be connected to efforts to influence official actions.