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Indications emerged last week in a US District Court in Virginia that the FBI may have been working on the assumption that Nigeria's former Vice President Atiku Abubakar actually had received a bribe from of US Congressman William Jefferson who was thought to have been bribing the former Nigerian Vee Pee, Empowered Newswire reports.

Preliminary hearing was held last week Thursday at a Virginia court in the three year old criminal investigation, to determine whether items seized by the FBI when it raided the Congressman's house in 2005 and what the Congressman said during the raid should be part of the trial.

Significant among what was seized is the alleged $90,000 cash, part of what is alleged to be $100,000 which the US government is claiming he intended to use as offer of bribe to then Nigeria's Vice President Abubakar. Abubakar has constantly denied soliciting or accepting any bribe from the US Congressman.

A criminal trial is now set to commence next month, Feb. 25 and observers say it cannot be ruled out yet that the former Nigerian Vice President may be invited as a witness for the Congressman in the US court in Virginia.

The US government had already indicted the Congressman on a count of 18 charges but have not indicated any intention to charge the former Nigerian Vice President. The US government through the State Department had said in the past that the case was against the US Congressman and not against Nigeria's Vice President. But a revelation in court last week showed that until the FBI agents found the $90,000 cash in Jefferson's freezer, they suspected that the money had been passed on to Abubakar.

During last week's testimony in court, Congressman Jefferson said he was alarmed when an FBI agent started yelling at him the congressman denied paying a bribe to former vice president Abubakar to cement a lucrative telecommunications deal in Nigeria. the FBI agent in court denied being enraged.

Just before the FBI agents raided Congressman Jefferson's home, they had filmed him receiving $100,000 from government informant and Virginia businesswoman Lori Mody. Much of the money, $90,000, was later found in the freezer of Jefferson's Washing ton DC residence inside his freezer.

But at the time of the raid, the FBI agents, according to Associated Press reports, believed Congressman Jefferson had handed the money to Vice President Atiku Abubakar days earlier.

Testifying in court last week, Congressman Jefferson again denied FBI's claim of having passed the money to Abubakar or even planning any bribe, and added that his denial enraged one of the FBI agents who were searching his house then.

Jefferson quoted an FBI agent saying (after he-the US Congressman had denied giving the bribe) "where the hell is my goddamn money?' adding "the FBI agent "yelled this at me."

At that point, according to AP, Jefferson said he declined to answer any more questions from the FBI during the raid. But another FBI agent pulled out a portable DVD player and showed him the video segment of him accepting the brown, cash-stuffed briefcase from a government informant outside the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Arlington, Va.

But the US Judge in the matter on Thursday did not allow the US Congressman explain why he took the cash that was later found in his freezer-the cash allegedly intended to be passed on to Atiku.

In a 16-count indictment filed last June, the US Justice Department has accused Jefferson, a 10-term congressman as being the mastermind in a web of international bribery schemes. But the congressman has denied any wrongdoing.

Charged against the 60 year old Jefferson, who was formerly co-chairman of the congressional caucuses on Nigeria and African trade includes allegations that he solicited hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes for himself and his family, falsely reported foreign trips as official business and sought to bribe the former Nigerian vice president.

It is unclear what effect Jefferson's statements might have if they are used at his trial, scheduled to start Feb. 25. Prosecutors have said he made several potentially incriminating remarks, questioning how his reputation could survive and asking that the search warrant affidavit be permanently sealed to keep the information from being made public.

Lawyers to the embattled US Congressman are seeking to exclude the seized items at the 2005 raid and the words spoken by the congressman during the raid to FBI agents from the trail. Their argument is that the FBI agents bullied their client and made him feel that he was being detained, and in that case should have read him his Miranda rights, namely that he had a right to remain quiet if he chose but failing which whatever he said could be used against him in a court of law.

Jefferson's lawyers are saying since the FBI agents did not do that everything Jefferson told the agents during the two-hour interview should be suppressed. There are about 1,400 documents seized during the search which the Congressman's lawyers also wants excluded.

But the prosecutors from the US Justice department said the statements should be admitted in evidence as the congressman was not in custody at the search and because they said he agreed to answer questions from the FBI agents who "were courteous and respectful." The US court is yet to rule on the dispute.

Local US media and western news agencies reported that Congressman Jefferson's testimony last week "was his most extensive public comment on the case since his arraignment last year on charges that he used his congressional office and staff to enrich himself and his family."

The reports said U.S. Rep. William Jefferson, D-La., testified that an FBI agent cursed at him and told him that “this is going to be the worst day of your life,” just before agents searched his Louisiana home as part of the investigation that led to corruption charges against him.

At one point during the interview at his house in August 2005, Jefferson said, an FBI agent followed him to the bathroom. “I told him, ‘Are you going to the bathroom with me?” Jefferson said in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, Va. “He said, ‘Yes sir”