The Native American lobbyist who says he brought the Jack Abramoff scandal to light says he disagreed with the judge’s sentencing of co-conspirator Kevin Ring to 20 months in prison.
“Two central points: Kevin Ring and his law firm employed a strategy of ‘everybody does it.’ That was the zeitgeist of the times for this decade and the proceeding decade. Those three words are the most dangerous words in the English language: ‘everybody does it.’ It is a refuge for cowards and children, and that legal strategy — he tried to put everyone on trial, and that was wrong,” Tom Rodgers told TPM following Ring’s sentencing on Wednesday.
“I think she should employ a more sense of restorative justice,” Rodgers said, suggesting that Ring should have been required to travel “to the Pine Ridge Reservation to serve the Sioux elders and Sioux children of the poorest county in the United States.”
Ryan J. Reilly
Ryan J. Reilly is a D.C.-based reporter for TPM. Prior to joining TPM, he worked for a news website covering the Justice Department and was a researcher for Bloomberg News. His email address is ryan(at)talkingpointsmemo.com.
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