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Prosecutors Drop Siegelman Appeal
From the AP:
Federal prosecutors are no longer seeking stiffer prison sentences for former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman and former HealthSouth CEO Richard Scrushy.Prosecutors filed a motion this week with the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals asking that their appeals of the sentences be dropped. Their appeal had sought a longer prison term than Siegelman's more than seven-year sentence and Scrushy's almost seven-year sentence.
The longer sentences that had been originally requested in the prosecutors' appeal were 30 years for Siegelman, and 25 years for Scrushy.
Late last week, Siegelman received a surge of support from a bi-partisan group of 54 former state attorneys general when they filed a friend of the court brief with the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in support of Siegelman's appeal of his conviction.
On Monday, Richard Scrushy filed his appeal with the 11th Circuit, requesting the court throw out his conviction in the corruption case that snared him and Siegelman, arguing that there was a lack of evidence and that jurors improperly communicated by e-mail.
From the AP's story:
The latest filing does not say why prosecutors want to drop their appeal.
Whether this is evidence of the tide turning or the worm turning, something is finally turning.
It's getting through to over-confident Republicans—who apparently bought into Rove's "permanent Republican" rule—that they'd better prepare for being out of power.
Sometimes self-preservation benefits The People.
June 4, 2008 1:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
I believe team Bush is more than worried about "being out of power." It surely is not hard to imagine some of his team of fraudulent indictors themselves becoming indictees.
It is just a matter of time.
June 4, 2008 2:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
About time these 'bought and paid fors' stood down. I hope the next incarnation of the DOJ has a good time stringing them up for their crimes.
June 4, 2008 2:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
Scrushy really is a crook. He deserves 25 years.
June 4, 2008 3:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
The prosecutors on the Siegleman case may have been corrupt, but they aren't stupid. They know that their little game is spoiled so will now play it close to the vest and fight a rear guard action to protect their plausible deniablity to avoid prosecution themselves.
Republicans have used plausible denisability with great success in the past and it may save their skins from a legal point of view on this instance of Banana Republic styly law enformcent, but with any luck the entire legal profession will look on all this in great horror and do more in the future to protect the integrity of the entire justice system.
June 5, 2008 12:40 AM | Reply | Permalink