On Thursday morning, Detroit’s Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick (D) and his chief of staff, Christine Beatty -- and all of Detroit, courtesy of the Detroit Free Press -- woke up to find the irrefutable evidence of the love affair they had both denied under oath:

Beatty asked the mayor, on Sept. 12, 2002, if she could "come and lay down in your room until you get back?"

The next morning Kilpatrick, referring to his bodyguards, wrote: "They were right outside the door. They had to have heard everything."

Beatty replied: "So we are officially busted!"

"Damn that," Kilpatrick responded. "Never busted. Busted is what you see!"

Worse than the humiliation and embarrassment at the very public disclosure of both their affair and the unraveled coverup, is, yes, the real possibility of getting "busted" on a perjury charge, a felony. If charged and convicted, Kilpatrick, a lawyer, could be disbarred, would be removed from office, and could even face up to 15 years of jail time. Beatty, a law student, would have to find a new career.

The other big loser in this tawdry affair is the city of Detroit.

The mayor has cost Detroit taxpayers more than $9 million to date, because he was sued as a public official. Many are calling for the resignation of “a mayor with so much potential squandered on the keyboard,” a “talented” and “charismatic ” politician - “so knowledgeable on policy, so lacking in discipline.”

It all started back in April 2003 when one of the mayor’s bodyguards, Harold Nelthrope, blew the whistle on two of the cops on the mayor’s security detail; they were fraudently padding their expenses, wrecking city cars and drinking and partying while on duty. Nelthrope also passed along rumors about a bash at the mayor's residence involving a stripper. Deputy Police Chief Gary Brown began to investigate. Two weeks later, he was out of a job.

Three weeks later, Brown and Nelthrope sued the mayor and the city, claiming they were fired in retaliation for investigating the mayor’s security team. Later that year, another bodyguard, Walt Harris, sued the city and the mayor, making the same charges as the other two. He also alleged that the mayor retaliated against him because he reported that the mayor was cheating on his wife with Beatty and several other women.

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They say everything is bigger in Texas. And sure enough, if you've ever seen a bigger legal mess than the case of Texas Supreme Court Justice David Medina, we'd love to hear about it.

Last June, the Medinas' house burned down in a fire that spread to two other houses, causing a total of about $900,000 in damages. Investigators suspected arson when they found an accelerant in the Medinas’ garage where the fire started. And the discovery that the house had been in foreclosure a year earlier deepened their suspicion. Medina and his wife gave conflicting accounts of the judge’s whereabouts at the time of the fire.

So Harris County District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal (R) duly convened a grand jury to examine the evidence. After deliberating three months past the scheduled end of its term, the jurors told prosecutor Vic Wisner on Thursday to prepare the indictments.

Wisner refused.

According to jury foreman Bob Ryan, “He slammed the door and left.” Later, Wisner thought better of that and agreed to prepare the indictments.

Medina was charged with tampering with or falsifying evidence, and his wife with arson, both felonies. Arson carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison; tampering with an investigation, a maximum of 10 years. They were set free on bail—$20,000 for Mrs. Medina and $5,000 for the judge.

The next day, Rosenthal dismissed the charges.

Ryan, who’s served as foreman on grand juries at least four times, was not happy: “This is ludicrous.... Mr. Rosenthal never put his head in the door and heard one word of testimony.”

Both Ryan and the assistant foreman, Jeffrey Dorrell, alleged that the jury was given to understand, before hearing any evidence, that the case had no merit.

“It was theater of the absurd,” observed Dorrell. "We knew before we handed the indictment down that the district attorney was going to refuse to prosecute, but we did it anyway.”

Ryan is considering reconvening the grand jury next week.

To add to the mess, the two have risked breaking a law that mandates the secrecy of grand jury proceedings; both say they haven't actually crossed the line.

But late Friday, Medina’s attorney, Terry Yates, filed a motion asking for a hearing to determine whether Ryan and Dorrell acted illegally. (If held in contempt, the pair could be fined $500 and given 30 days in jail.)

Yates accused them of indicting Medina in order to embarrass Rosenthal: “They've made a mockery of the entire process... This is crazy. This is mind-boggling, what this grand jury has done. This is more than a runaway grand jury. This is a grand jury speeding away in a Lamborghini.”

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One might say that Scott Eckersley did his job too well.

As deputy counsel to Governor Matt Blunt (R) of Missouri, Eckersley gave the governor and his staff impeccable legal advice. According to the lawsuit Eckersley filed against Blunt and other administration members, he told them they were violating Blunt's own written instructions, document retention policy and Missouri's Sunshine Law by deleting all their emails.

Since the governor and his pals were deleting emails to preclude the scandal that would likely hit them if they became public, Eckersley's advice was unwelcome, and since he was in charge of complying with the state's freedom of information law, he became inconvenient, to say the least. Ed Martin, Blunt's chief of staff, fired Scott Eckersley on September 28.

Things went downhill from there, according to Eckersley's suit. Shortly afterwards, aware of the threat posed by a resentful employee who felt he had been wrongfully dismissed, Blunt and his aides took the offensive by sending to newspapers packets insinuating that (among other things) Eckersley was interested in kinky sex and drugs. Eckersley asserted that the governor's staff had gone into his personal email account and sent unopened spam to bolster their defamatory claims.

In late October, Eckersley announced that he'd been fired in retaliation for objecting to the illegal activities of the governor and his aides. Blunt (son of House Republican Whip Roy Blunt (R-MO)) denied the charge and told reporters that Eckersley was fired because he was habitually late and did private work on government time. Eckersley countered that he had been repeatedly praised for his work.

Kindling this mucky firestorm is the gubernatorial election this fall. Republican Gov. Blunt expects to face Democratic Jay Nixon, the attorney general of Missouri.

That rivalry underlies Eckersley's whole case.

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Last year ex-GOPer Paul Morrison decided he'd rather party with the Democrats if it meant he could defeat his arch-nemesis in the Kansas attorney general election. After his party switch, Morrison was elected Kansas attorney general but last week a torrid sex-and-politics scandal caused him to announce his resignation, effective January 31, 2008.

Name sound familiar? A few weeks ago we wrote about how the former Kansas Attorney General, Phill Kline, had been skipping work and living outside of the county he was supposed to be prosecutor for. Sprinkled throughout the story were mentions of Kline's political rival Paul Morrison, who had essentially switched jobs with Kline, stepping up to Attorney General and leaving the post of Johnson County District Attorney.

Now Morrison's in the muck. It started with a quickie at the courthouse with a female employee of his office. Many more quickies followed, in county offices and motels throughout Kansas and in at least three other states, in what became a two-year long extramarital affair between Morrison and Linda Carter, the longtime Johnson County District Attorney's Office director of administration.

Morrison won the attorney general election in August 2006, one year after the couple's first tryst. In December 2006, he bought her a $16,000 engagement ring, although they were both still married. Around the same time, Phill Kline became Johnson County District Attorney, and Carter's new boss.

By November 2007, the illicit romance had seriously soured. Carter filed a sexual harassment complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on November 8, resigning three weeks later. (She wasn't the first person to accuse Morrison of indiscretion -- a different female employee of the Johnson County's DA's office filed two lawsuits accusing him of inappropriate conduct fifteen years ago, but dropped them.)

Amid the sexual harassment claims, the suit alleges that Morrison tried to have his girlfriend spy on the enemy. Carter retained her position in the DA's office when Kline came in to head it, and her suit says Morrison tried to have her snoop into Kline's ongoing criminal investigation of Planned Parenthood, and regularly questioned her about its progress. She also says Morrison repeatedly tried to coerce her into advocating for the eight former Morrison colleagues who Kline fired. Then, when the relationship began to fall apart, Morrison called her 22 times in one day, threatening to ruin her career.

Morrison has admitted to the affair but denies the allegations in Carter's lawsuit. He has said that Carter and Kline are trying to smear him for their own benefit.

Carter's statements portray Morrison as a man haunted by the twin obsessions of love and hate.
Consumed by passion:

...According to Carter's statement, Morrison also made five back-to-back telephone calls from Lenexa to her at about 4 a.m. In part, Morrison wanted to know whether Carter had obtained a tattoo to demonstrate her commitment to him. She hadn't, her statement said, despite Morrison's acquisition of a tattoo.

Yet possessed by loathing:

In the twilight of their extramarital affair, Linda Carter urged Paul Morrison to let her go, repair his shattered marriage and resolve his hatred of Phill Kline.

If not, Carter said, Morrison's life would remain a powder keg. A destructive fireball, when eventually triggered, would consume all in his wake: wife, children, friends, colleagues — even Carter.

It appears her prediction that Morrison's "hatred of Kline was going to destroy" him may be coming true. Kline has secured the power to handpick the special prosecutor who will investigation Morrison.

Ramona Cunningham's job was to help unemployed Iowans. Instead, she and other executives of the Central Iowa Employment and Training Consortium (CIETC) are charged with stealing millions of taxpayer dollars targeted toward the effort. That may seem an egregious crime. But really, who better to teach wayward job seekers how to seize opportunity when it comes?

Cunningham was the chief executive officer at CIETC, a non-profit that used to be the primary state-funded job training organization in central Iowa. During its heyday, it ran on millions in federal, state, and local grants. But a state audit in the spring of 2006 revealed that between $1.3 and $1.8 million in taxpayer funds designated to train unemployed Central Iowans were instead used to inflate the salaries and bonuses of the three top CIETC executives. Cunningham's salary during the 30 months that public money was being pilfered was $795,384, three times that of Iowa's governor. Four CIETC officials were indicted and two have pleaded guilty.

Besides dipping into public funds, Cunningham went on trips to casinos across the state with favored CIETC employees who drank and gambled during business hours, time they claimed to be working. CIETC workers also skipped all or part of out-of-town training conferences to gamble in Las Vegas, Reno, St. Louis and Kansas City. All of those activities took place during times when government paperwork showed that the employees were working. One employee, who prosecutors characterized as Cunningham’s favorite, made more than 100 workday gambling trips between 2003 and early 2006 (if his co-workers who testified are to be believed). Victor Scaglione said he felt that the trips were kosher because he felt compelled by Cunningham to participate (and don't good employees always listen to management?). He will serve 16 months in a halfway house and home confinement for lying to the grand jury during its investigation of the misused funds.

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Last week a few national blogs picked up KCTV-5's investigation of Johnson County, Kansas District Attorney and anti-abortion crusader extraordinaire Phill Kline. Kline was Kansas Attorney General until voters ousted him in December of 2006 in favor of former Johnson County DA Paul Morrison, who became a Democrat in order to run against Kline. After Kline lost, the state GOP appointed him to fill Morrison's shoes in Johnson County, a district where he was highly unpopular, in a decision party officials now regret. The two men, Morrison and Kline -- whose destinies are clearly intertwined -- effectively switched jobs.

And how is Kline performing in his new position, which nets him $143,000 a year?

KCTV reported that Kline only spends 29 hours a week in his office, frequently only for a few hours a day, which other Kansas DAs said falls far short of the time necessary to do the job. And the news channel also says Kline's legal residence in Johnson County is a sham -- he rents a crumby apartment above a storage facility at $400 a month, while keeping his Topeka dwelling. KCTV reporters watched the Johnson County apartment for "weeks," with no sign of Kline.

In a rebuttal, Kline's spokesman said that the reporters would have seen Kline leaving his apartment "if they woke up a little earlier to catch him when he leaves for work" and reminded people "that the DA job is not strictly confined to the four walls of the DA office."

So where was Kline while he was at not-work and not-Johnson County? There is some speculation that he was devoting time to his favorite cause.

If you feel like you've read the name "Phill" spelled with two L's somewhere before, it was probably connected to the anti-abortion crusade. Kline's obsession with the issue has made him a darling of the pro-lifers. His critics say he put his energy into campaigning with pro-life groups. And while on the job, he's stayed true to the same aim, filing a 107-count criminal complaint against Planned Parenthood. The complaint is interesting because 1) Planned Parenthood filed a lawsuit against him first, and 2) his foil, current AG Paul Morrison, had decided not to file charges against Planned Parenthood after conducting what he called a "thorough" investigation of allegations Kline made while he was Kansas AG.

But it gets muckier.

Kline must subscribe to the same podcast as Alberto Gonzales or something, because he fired eight attorneys in his office without reason on his first day as Johnson County DA in January. Now those attorneys are suing him, and the judge has not been ruling in his favor. The fired attorneys say Kline axed them because they had no political loyalty to him. Kline says he can ax whoever he wants. Sound familiar?

Whatta guy. Too bad he's said he's not seeking re-election. Maybe he's tired of living in his $400/mo. storage closet.

Ah, Illinois. Only this Wednesday ex-Governor George Ryan (R-IL) became prisoner 16627-424, convicted of racketeering charges in April. Now, the feds are looking closely at Rod Blagojevich (D-IL), who ran his campaign on the promise of cleaning up what Ryan left behind. With several recent indictments of the governor's political fundraisers, the feds have been closing the vise. The most troubling tie for Blagojevich these days is the relationship connecting him, his wife Patti, and Tony Rezko.

Rezko has been a longtime supporter of the Blagojevichs; The Chicago Tribune reported in 2005 that Rezko and Patti Blagojevich had a business relationship tracing back as early as 1997. In 2003, real estate deals with Rezko accounted for roughly one-quarter of Patti’s income (they have ceased their business deals since 2004). He also demonstrated what might generously be called a knack for getting friends appointed to state board positions.

But Rezko was indicted on extortion charges in 2006. And though the Governor has not been named by investigators, there is this revelation by the Associated Press:

But Antoin "Tony" Rezko, a Blagojevich political confidant and friend, is under indictment, accused of seeking campaign contributions from investment companies in exchange for getting them business with a state pension fund.

In one case, the indictment claims Rezko demanded a company make a $1.5 million contribution to "a certain public official." That was Blagojevich, according to a person familiar with the investigation, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the probe is continuing.

Rezko has so far not turned state’s evidence, but with a trial coming up in February, Blagojevich might very well have reason to be nervous.

Of course, if Rezko doesn’t float your boat, there are other investigations that might sink the governor.

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The long arm of the law is just a little too short to push Sheriff Ricky Headley from office.

A grand jury recently indicted Headley on thirty-seven drug related charges, among them twenty-one felony counts that include dispensing drugs illegally and official misconduct. That's an increase from the original indictment, which included just two counts of wearing his uniform and driving his official vehicle while illegally obtaining prescription meds. Ricky, the sheriff for Williamson County, Tennessee, is facing expulsion from his job if found guilty of a felony; his trial is set for next July.

Until then, Ricky is sitting tight as sheriff. And, much to the chagrin of locals, there's nothing anyone can do about it. In almost every case of police abuse, the accused officer is put on leave pending a resolution of his case. That would be true even for Ricky's deputies, but not Ricky himself. As an elected official, no one can make Ricky do anything (with the exception of the state attorney general, who has not signaled an interest in the case). Local officials can't force him to step down, nor can they require him to take leave from his position. They can't even take away the car in which he allegedly made his drug runs.

Ricky has pleaded not guilty on all charges and says he intends to serve out the rest of his term (until 2010). And since he is all cleaned up (Ricky spent less than a month in rehab for his addiction to prescription drugs), he sees no reason not to be back out there enforcing the law. And so far, it doesn't look like he's going to change his tune.

Thanks to Alberto Gonzales, it will be a long time for the Justice Department before prosecutors can pursue a Democrat without suspicion. The case against State Senator Matt McCoy (D-IA) is another one of those prosecutions now mediated through the lens of the politicization of the Department.

Matt McCoy was indicted last March on one count of extortion, and he is set for trial next week. McCoy's business partner, Tom Vasquez, installs security systems for elderly citizens. When Vasquez sought to install his product for clients with Medicaid, McCoy allegedly threatened to block the deal (by getting the state Medicaid office to remove the business as a Medicaid vendor) unless he received $100 for each installation. Federal authorities claim that McCoy collected over $2,000 before December 2005, and they have recorded ten hours of conversation between the two men as evidence.

When the case first broke, pundits cried foul, citing the brewing U.S. Attorney scandal as evidence that the prosecutor was reaffirming his status as a "loyal Bushie." Local pundit David Ypsen noted that the prosecutor is a strong social conservative who was slated earlier this year to emcee an event for the Iowa Christian Coalition. Needless to say: "Active involvement in ideological political action groups like that is rare for U.S. attorneys in Iowa — and even the Justice Department higher-ups seemed to think better of it."

Now, with only a week until the trial begins, McCoy is echoing the cry. In a filing this week, his attorney seeks to have the case dismissed on grounds of prosecutorial abuse. According to court documents, the government withheld from the grand jury taped conversations in which McCoy explicitly told Vasquez that he would not suffer retribution if he didn't share his earnings. The filing also accuses the government of intercepting emails between McCoy and his attorney, as well as surreptitiously paying Vasquez to cooperate in the prosecution (even offering him a bonus if the case returned a guilty plea).

The government has yet to respond to McCoy's call for an investigation. But McCoy has not shied way from accusing his accusers. Earlier in the year, McCoy, who is openly gay (after being outed by an arch-conservative lawmaker on the Iowa Senate floor), claimed, "I have been a continuous target of groups targeting gays to advance their own agendas of intolerance and hate. Clearly, there is significant speculation about what has motivated federal officials to take this action against me." But McCoy has backed down from that accusation, at least, saying "since then, I honestly have to say, I have found no evidence to support some of the thoughts that I had at the time that I shared with the media." So for now, McCoy's suspicion is confined to whether prosecutors only went after him because he's a Democrat.

Oral Roberts built his university and medical research center with nothing but his own sweat, grit and vision of a 900-foot Jesus (oh, and lots of contributions from his viewers). But now, his son Richard is accused of using the school as his own private cash cow and forcing faculty members to illegally dive into Tulsa politics.

Dr. Tim Brooker and two other former professors are suing the university and President Roberts for wrongful termination. In a petition this week, Brooker maintains he and his colleagues were fired for presenting a laundry list of complaints compiled against Roberts and his wife, including: 11 remodels of their university home, $800/month cell phone bills, horses for their children and scholarships for their friends, all on the school's dime.

But it's Brooker's complaints about the 2005 mayoral election that bring the story to All Muck is Local. Dr. Brooker is a successful professor of practical politics; his work has brought him enough attention for the Republican National Committee to base a program out of ORU to help shape national campaigns and issues. Brooker maintains (and his students have confirmed) that his class never focused on local politics, because it “turns neighbors into enemies.”

But in December of 2005, Brooker claims that Roberts approached him and said it was time to leverage ORU's funds and campaign experience to support Randi Miller – a county commissioner and friend of Roberts'- in her mayoral bid. Brooker pointed out that directly supporting a local candidate was a bad idea, not least because it would violate the university's 501(c)(3) status. Roberts insisted, and eventually the school began to shill for Miller. When the IRS did indeed contact the university about its campaign activities, Roberts allegedly told Brooker to take the fall and to deny that his employer or the university proper had played a role. The cover-up was driven home when the university provost signed an affidavit attesting to Roberts deniability- a statement that Brooker says he wrote and that the university intentionally distorted and even changed in order to absolve the president.

Roberts says that God says this case is a matter of “blackmail and extortion,” claiming that the plaintiff's lawyer holds a personal grudge against him after losing millions of dollars to ORU over several cases. “'We live in a litigious society. Anyone can get mad and file a lawsuit against another person whether they have a legitimate case or not,'" God told Roberts.

In a phone call Friday, the lawyer, Gary Richardson, told me that he is not seeking “to kill the cow to get to the milk,” and that he's only interested in the corrupt practices of the university's current administration. He also says he's only been in a single case involving the university's adjacent hospital; the case never went to trial.

In the Arizona legislature, one DUI on your record is fine. But two is really pushing things.

State Rep. Trish Groe (R-AZ) is preparing for her arraignment this Monday on one count of aggravated DUI and another of false reporting, entered in a September 18th indictment.

Groe was pulled over last March, after an officer noticed her swerving at 70 mph in a 55 mph zone . At first she denied having been drinking, but then informed the officer that she was a “functional alcoholic." Two separate tests confirmed her blood-alcohol content was roughly twice the legal limit. Shortly after the arrest, Groe took a leave of absence from her legislative position and checked into a rehabilitation clinic.

But the woes have returned now that her arraignment date approaches. In Arizona, a DUI is generally treated as a misdemeanor and judges usually shorten the 30-day sentence down to 10 days. However, Groe’s case is compounded by the fact that she lied to the officer about having a valid driver’s license. In actuality, her license had been revoked due to an outstanding ticket in California. This bumps her charge up to a felony. In addition, it certainly won’t help her case that Groe had already been arrested for a DUI in 1999 (also in California).

Local Democrats began calling for her resignation immediately after the indictment. Republicans, always sensitive to the judicial process, have insisted that the system do its job before any rash decisions are made. Groe will be required to leave her position only if she is convicted of a felony. Since it is likely that her case will be argued down to a misdemeanor she may be able to keep her public position, but it is unlikely that she will entirely avoid jail time.

Only a month before, Groe wrote on her blog (in response to another representative’s legislation), “How about focusing on enforcement of the current law against reckless driving instead of passing new legislation?” Presumably, come Monday she’ll get her wish.

Who knew having the state help pay for a transatlantic hunting trip could come back to haunt you?

This past Thursday, Virginia's attorney general unsealed indictments against three former top officials from the state's Game and Wildlife Fisheries Agency. William Woodfin Jr., the agency's former director, and former game wardens Michael Caison and Terry Bradbery face a combined five counts of misspending government funds.

Officially, the indictments don’t spell out the circumstances under which the men misused the funds; it only states that the crimes occurred sometime between 2003 and 2004. However, a state audit released in 2005 was highly critical of the general infighting and cronyism amid the department’s top officials. The audit harped on one spending item in particular: an African safari.

Okay, so the department didn’t entirely finance a safari trip to Zimbabwe for Woodfin, Caison and Bradbery. Rather, Dan Hoffler --a former chairman of the department’s oversight board-- paid for most of the trip, suggesting that it would be a learning experience (and Hoffler came along too). But the three men did use state credit cards to pick up a few of the extra costs along the way, such as: rifle bags, digital cameras, four DVD players (always crucial on a hunting trip), and a satellite phone that they used to call their families. All told, Virginia taxpayers ended up footing $11,532 in “trip expenses.”

All three men have expressed through their lawyers that they intend to plead not guilty to the charges. And it's apparent that the 2005 state audit, which was turned over to investigators years ago, is what’s at issue in the indictments. Bradbery’s lawyer told reporters “the state is not out any money whatsoever. This (Africa) trip was approved.” Hoffler, who will not face charges for his role in the affair, admitted to cooperating with the investigation and said he was “extremely disappointed” in the indictments.

To an outsider, New Jersey politics often seems like a den of corruption. The latest series of arrests doesn’t do much to change that reputation.

This week, eleven local politicians and one co-conspirator were arrested as part of a statewide bribery scandal. The crowd runs the gamut of the political scene: mayors, assembly members, staffers and local council members have all been charged. The list is dominated by ten Democrats, although one Republican makes it a bipartisan affair.

The story is slowly unfolding, as the FBI has only disclosed enough information to provide probable cause for the arrests. But it is clear that the operation began in the town of Pleasantville, where FBI agents posed as representatives from an insurance company and a roofing agency. Agents met individually with members of the town’s education council, setting up deals throughout the past year to pay cash bribes in exchange for contracts.

It would have made for a quick story of small town corruption, but the Pleasantville school board members recommended that their new FBI friends look for more "business" upstate. From there, the FBI’s insurance company bounced from willing politician to willing politician, taking them to the cities of Newark, Orange, Passaic and Patterson. As in all prime cases of local corruption, underhanded deals were carried out in parked cars and restaurants.

The two highest ranked officials are Alfred Steele, a state assemblyman, and Mims Hackett, Jr., also an assemblyman as well as the mayor of Orange. It was on Steele’s recommendation that investigators were introduced to Hackett; both men promised to help the would-be insurers obtain state contracts in exchange for cash.

Christopher Christie, the U.S. Attorney leading the investigation, took a play out of the Giuliani textbook. He organized a series of public arrests complete with handcuffs and leg shackles for the twelve, who were released on bail Thursday and left to shirk the herd of reporters on their own. (Steele resorted to running away from the press, which resulted in a rush-hour traffic jam.) Still, the Democratic leadership have been quick to challenge claims that Christie is playing partisan politics. Senate President Richard Codey addressed local Democrats on Friday saying, "these questions about whether the U.S. Attorney is too political, that's not the question. He didn't put a gun to anyone's head and force them to put their hand in the cookie jar."

As of now, both Steele and Hackett look set to resign their positions on Monday. We'll see if the immediate response of outrage by local Democrats helps to ameliorate the reputation that New Jersey is still the home of Tony Soprano and dirty politicians.

Make room Craig, Vitter and Bob. Coy Privette (R-NC) wants to join the summer of scandal!

Privette, a 74-year old retired pastor, has pleaded guilty to six counts of soliciting a prostitute. Privette is a long-time participant in North Carolina politics, spending eight years in the state house and another nine as a commissioner of Cabarrus County. He is a staunch social conservative and, until recently, President of the Christian Action League.

The trouble started for Privette back in May, when an unnamed woman cashed a blank check with his signature on it. The woman had a second check, already written out for $4,000. She explained that the checks weren’t given to her, but to a friend who had asked her to cash them. Privette was alerted of the possible forgery; he said he had indeed lost the two checks and the bank refunded his money. Case closed.

Well, not for the police. They traced the checks back to one Tiffany Summers. But on July 19th, a court indicted both Summers and Privette. Apparently, he had paid her for services at least six times over as many months. Privette immediately stepped down from his Christian advocacy group; he later pleaded guilty on August 22nd. The judge has agreed to expunge his record upon completing 48 hours of community service, saying he's only concerned with "making sure the behavior stopped."

Privette would be happy to leave the embarrassing matter at that, having very publicly learned his lesson (i.e.- if you've got world enough and time, don't pay for a prostitute with a blank check). But local Republicans aren’t having it. They are furious that Coy has not resigned his commissioner position (if you recall, North Carolina GOP have already had its share of embarrassment from former state reps). Each of his fellow commissioners (all Republicans) has publicly demanded he resign. On Friday, the state Republican chairman sent him a letter demanding he step down, saying, "he's dishonored and disgraced."

For his part, Privette said Friday he is staying on the job. But the moment of truth will likely be this Tuesday, when he meets with the entire board of commissioners. It promises to be an awkward conversation.

Pennsylvania Superior Court Judge Michael Joyce (R) has a problem of saying one thing and doing another.

Here’s what Joyce, who was indicted Monday on nine counts of money laundering and mail fraud, has said. Back in 2001, he was in a car accident. The injury was so bad that he had to forgo almost all physical activity. According to the narrative he filed with his insurance company, he couldn’t golf. He didn’t renew his scuba license because he couldn’t swim. And though he had received a primary nomination to the state Supreme Court, now the pain from his injuries meant that he couldn’t even imagine running an election campaign.

The only problem is, that’s not true. Okay, so some of it is true. Joyce was involved in a fender-bender with another car (at speeds around 5 miles per hour). The bump was minor, so no police or medics were called to the scene. And it is true that a year later Joyce filed insurance claims with both his insurer and that of the other driver; he received settlements totaling $440,000. And to be fair, even low-speed accidents can produce chronic injuries.

What doesn’t seem to be true is the idea that Joyce was suffering very much. He said he couldn’t play golf. But he turned in sixteen completed scorecards between the accident and the filing (who wants to lose his golf handicap?). He said he had forgone his scuba license. But a December 2001 check to the Professional Association of Driving Instructors says otherwise, as does a June 2002 scuba trip to Jamaica. Joyce says he had to abandon his hopes of a Supreme Court campaign, despite the support of his party. But the grand jury indictment says he received no such endorsement or nomination, and his local Republicans have so far agreed. You can see the full indictment here.

In fact, Joyce even found time in 2002 to pick up a few new hobbies. When he wasn’t driving around on the motorcycle he bought with the first round of his insurance money, Joyce was enjoying another new hobby: flying. Between April and October, he piloted a plane over fifty times. And in order to pilot, he had to sign off saying he that he was not experiencing physical limitations or problems. He even put some of his insurance windfall towards a down payment on a private plane.

Joyce is set to fight the indictment in court, promising to mount a “a vigorous legal defense.” Then again, he also said last week that he had no plans to abandon his reelection campaign. But this week, he announced that he will retire after this term. So it remains to be seen if this is the time Michael Joyce actually does what he says.

Call it a rookie political mistake. It's one thing for a politician to lend a hand to his constituents, particularly the ones who can afford to make campaign contributions. But please; be discreet.

Last week Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning ordered Nelnet, a student lending company caught up in the recent industry-wide scandal, to pay a fine of one million dollars. Nelnet has, at least twice, paid university administrators who recommended that students finance their debt through the firm. The company is also hired by universities to educate students about how to pay for college; not illegal, but surely a conflict-of-interest practice that they have agreed to stop.

So what’s wrong with this picture? Nothing, except the million dollars is actually a fine that Bruning assigned the company all the way back in April, a fine that he forgave only two weeks ago.

Bruing erased the fine after New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo ordered a similar punishment for Nelnet. Cuomo has made investigating student lenders a focus of his office; already, several banks have been ordered to contribute to a national education fund. Cuomo announced on July 31st that Nelnet would be paying $2 million to the fund.

Upon hearing the news, Bruning immediately forgave Nelnet his part of the obligation. He also used the opportunity to take a few shots at his fellow AG, saying that he “never believed that the investigation was particularly useful.” Bruning went even further, saying, "Nelnet is an ethical, decent, honest company…. I will never apologize for being a defender of Nelnet."

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Call it a case of mistaken prosecution. West Virginia State Senator Oshel Craigo (D-WV) went down to defeat in 2002 after Republicans (drawing on tight ties to the state's U.S. attorney) spread the word that he was under federal investigation. But it's a funny thing: Craigo was never actually prosecuted. And now his successor Lisa Smith (R), who rose to victory on the news of Craigo's legal troubles, is headed to jail for the same crime.

Smith acknowledged in her plea that she and her husband committed tax fraud by not paying the IRS employment taxes generated by their in-home health care companies. But, more interesting to Local Muck fans (both of them), Smith has also admitted that she intentionally created and submitted a false campaign finance statement during her 2002 state senate bid. Smith made up records that $15,000 had been contributed to her campaign by friends and family; the money actually came from her own pocket. Ironically, it was allegations of campaign finance fraud that helped Smith win office back in 2002.

Smith began her political career in 2000 when she was elected to the West Virginia state house. In 2002, she challenged Democratic incumbent Oshel Craigo for his state senate seat, in what became the most expensive race of the season.

Only a few weeks before a tight general election, the local Republican committee sent around press releases claiming that Craigo was under federal investigation for falsely filing a campaign finance report. The press ran with the story, and Craigo lost the race. He blamed the press stories for his loss, and he wasn’t the only one. Gary Abernath, former state Republican Party executive director, said in 2005 that, “the investigation itself never did seem to yield any results, but the publicizing of it no doubt led to Craigo's defeat."

Abernathy would know; he played a key role in pushing the story to the media. But who gave him the the tip on the investigation? Abernanthy got the lead from Kris Warner, then chairman of the West Virginia Republican Committee. If the Warner name sounds familiar, it might be because his brother Kasey Warner was a U.S. Attorney who was a brief tangent in this year’s firing scandal.* The Warners are third generation West Virginia Republicans; their brother got in trouble in 2004 for printing "Bush/Warner" signs without the President's permission.

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Nine months ago, Eliot Spitzer was a shining star in the Democratic Party with a sterling career as a Wall Street-busting Attorney General, a landslide gubernatorial victory and a promise to bring ethics back to New York politics. That was then.

Now, a plan by his senior staffers to smear a top State Republican has backfired after findings from an investigation by the state’s Attorney General -- Democrat Andrew Cuomo -- were published this week. (You can get the report here [pdf]). Spitzer's office supplied false information to reporters, obtained with the help of the Police Superintendent, under the auspices of a Freedom of Information Letter (FOIL) request. The information was used in a July 1st article in the Times Union of Albany attacking State Senator Joseph Bruno’s (R) use of government planes to attend political events. Bruno, the Senate majority leader, is Spitzer's chief political adversary. (The published report clears Bruno of all charges of ethics violations.)

After the Times Union article was published, Spitzer's communications director Daren Dopp maintained that Bruno’s travel records were provided in response to a FOIL request from the paper. However, according to the Attorney General’s report, a FOIL request was submitted only three days before the article was submitted, with a second request--asking for information that was already contained in the article--coming on July 10th.

The report says that in January the Governor changed the procedure through which senior politicians could request use of state aircraft, requiring applicants to personally verify what purpose the travel served. By May, Spitzer’s staff was looking to use this new policy to embarrass Sen. Bruno, and then began gathering information on his travels. Spitzer’s police liaison, William Howard, placed several calls to the acting State Police Superintendent Preston Felton.

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This is exactly the kind of story for which our "All Muck is Local" series was created.

Simon Speights is the mayor of Lipscomb, Alabama. He got the job back in 2005 when his predecessor resigned and the City Council voted him in. But Speights isn’t exactly eligible to be mayor.

Speights pleaded guilty to burglary in 1994, and while his voting rights have since been restored, his right to run for political office has not. Records show Speights occasionally uses the surname Speight, which might account for no one realizing the mayor’s criminal record. Oh, and he’s driving a stolen car (no one knows how he got it). And he’s collecting more than twice his authorized salary (no one knows how that happened). Last week, the local district attorney demanded that a judge remove the mayor from office.

But who would replace him? The mayor pro tempore is Gaston Randle, a city councilman and the former police commissioner. Randle might not be the man people want in charge; last month he resigned his commissioner job after being indicted for stalking a local Hispanic woman. And more recently, Randle has been charged with extortion, bribing and impersonating an officer.

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Former Rep. Duke Cunningham (R-CA) used to cut seedy political deals over well-done steak at the posh Capital Grille. Jim Black had to settle for the bathroom at the local IHOP.

Black, a former Democrat in the North Carolina state legislature, was sentenced to five years in prison this week. (You can read the sentencing memorandum here.) Black admitted last February that he accepted bribes from three local chiropractors sometime between 2000 and 2002 in exchange for bringing chiropractor-friendly legislation to the floor.

But the real intrigue began in 2002, when state Republicans regained control of the House by a razor-thin 61-59 margin. Black, then Speaker at the time, had no plans to hand over the job. Enter the International House of Pancakes and long-time state Republican Michael Decker. Meeting in the restroom of the chain made famous for providing 24-hour access to flapjacks, Black struck a quick deal. In exchange for $50,000 and some party perks, Decker would switch affiliations and support Black in his bid for Speaker. Decker declared his newfound transformation into a Democrat, pocketed his $50,000 in cash and campaign contributions ad Black landed a job as co-speaker. Keep in mind that these charges did not come up in his criminal case, but he has admitted in civil court to paying Decker to switch parties.

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George Torres-Ramos is the owner of a successful chain of supermarkets situated throughout low-income neighborhoods in Los Angeles County. He's also under indictment, facing 59 counts of charges spanning from racketeering, violence in aid of racketeering, conspiracy to harbor illegal immigrants and several types of fraud that netted over $100 million. Along the way, Torres has been accused of bribing several officials to help secure liquor licenses. He’s also suspected of orchestrating three murders.

The trail to his indictment traces back to the end of the Clinton era. Officials at the Drug Enforcement Agency had long held suspicions that Torres was trafficking cocaine in his grocery trucks, but had never had enough evidence to to charge him. Torres’s business association with one Horacio Vignali eventually changed that.

Vignali had been identified as one of Torres’ business partners by the DEA, but any investigation into Torres had subsequently run out of steam. But Vignali became public news when his son's prison sentence for cocaine trafficking was commuted by President Clinton on the way out of office. Remarkably, President Clinton had received commutation requests from the sheriff, the U.S. Attorney, two Congressmen, the L.A. County Supervisor and the current mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.

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What is a politician to do when the other politicians won’t play with him?

Rep. Thomas Wright is an eight-term Democrat in the North Carolina House legislature. This past May 15th, the State Board of Elections looked into Wright’s finances, and were disturbed by what they found: like evidence suggesting that Wright had used over $200,000 of campaign funds for personal use, fraudulently obtained a mortgage, solicited money from a charity with a fake federal tax number, failed to report hundreds of thousands in campaign contributions and forged his campaign treasurer’s signature on checks. The Election Board was so worried that it sent reports to both the House leadership and the local District Attorney.

Now Wright is stuck between two probes: one from state prosecutors and one from the Joint Legislative Ethics Committee. But Wright, as he has been quick to remind his detractors, is innocent until proven guilty, and has remained steadfast in his commitment to serve his constituents, despite the fact that the governor, lieutenant governor and Speaker of the House have all called for his resignation (all three are fellow Democrats). Wright says of his situation, “I was elected by the people of my district and I'm here to serve them.... I'm voting and doing what I'm supposed to do.”

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It's so hard to find good help these days.

That seems to be especially true in presidential campaigns recently. Rudy Giuliani’s South Carolina state chairman has just been indicted on charges of cocaine possession. And Mitt Romney’s campaign is already in hot water after an aide allegedly impersonated a state trooper.

But the most recent case strikes close to home for the former Massachusetts governor. This week The Hill reported on several lawsuits that continue to follow Robert Lichfield, Romney’s co-chair of his Utah finance committee. Lichfield owns and operates boarding schools for troubled teens, but many former students are speaking out about their treatment while in school. From The Hill:

The complaint, which plaintiffs amended and resubmitted to the court last week, alleges children attending schools operated by Lichfield suffered abuses such as unsanitary living conditions; denial of adequate food; exposure to extreme temperatures; beatings; confinement in dog cages; and sexual fondling.

A second lawsuit filed by more than 25 plaintiffs in July in the U.S. District Court of the Northern District of New York alleges that Lichfield and several partners entered into a scheme to defraud them by operating an unlicensed boarding school in upstate New York. The suit does not allege physical or emotional abuse.

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