Several state road contractors received immunity from personal prosecution for testifying this week before a federal grand jury looking at the lack of competition for road-paving contracts, the Courier-Journal reported Friday.

        The grand jury sessions were Monday through Wednesday in Covington.

        Attorneys who represent some of the contractors said the immunity did not extend to their clients' companies.

        Antitrust prosecutors have been using the grand jury since at least February to examine aspects of Kentucky's road-paving industry, which lacks competition in large portions of the state, the newspaper said.

        Attorneys who represent contractors who testified this week say they have not been able to determine a specific focus of the probe. And the prosecutor overseeing it — Don Lyon, a trial attorney for the Justice Department's antitrust division office in Cleveland — declined to comment on the status or focus of the investigation.

        Henry Hinkle, president of Paris-based Hinkle Contracting, was among those who testified, according to his brother, Buckner Hinkle Jr., a Lexington attorney who also is general counsel to the family-owned construction firm. “Henry Hinkle did appear before the jury. He testified fully and answered all of their questions,” said Buckner Hinkle, who also said his brother testified under a grant of immunity.

        Henry Hinkle could not be reached for comment.

        Gregory Haynes, an attorney with the Wyatt Tarrant & Combs law firm, said it represents two contractors who testified before the grand jury under grants of immunity. Mr. Haynes declined to identify the contractors but said, “It is not at all unusual — in fact it is fairly routine — for prosecutors to grant immunity, particularly to those who are not considered targets of the investigation.”

        John Haydon, a vice president of Bardstown contractor Nally & Haydon, was also among the witnesses, according to his brother, state Rep. Jodie Haydon.

        “We're not afraid of anything. We have nothing to hide,” said Jodie Haydon, who also is a vice president of Nally & Haydon. John Haydon could not be reached to comment.

        The head of the state's largest asphalt contractor — Leonard Lawson, chairman of Lexington-based Mountain Enterprises — was not among this week's witnesses, according to the firm's attorney, John Reed.

        Mr. Reed said he believes the investigation has gone on for about two years. “We're not aware of anything that would indicate to any grand jury that Mountain's been involved in any antitrust violations,” he said.

        The newspaper found earlier that the state received only one bid for 58 percent of resurfacing contracts that it awarded between 1988 and 1994.

        The newspaper also found instances of some contractors' holding effective monopolies for state contracts for a group of counties adjacent to another group of counties where a different contractor faced no competition for state work.

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