public corruption

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Pay To Play Sheriff Indicted

December 16, 2021 by 4 Comments

I wrote about Santa Clara County Sheriff Laurie Smith last year and how big donors were rewarded with CCW permits. There were a number of indictments including that of a captain in the Santa Clara Sheriff’s Office. However, Sheriff Smith herself was never charged. That has changed.

Yesterday, a civil grand jury in Santa Clara County returns seven indictments against Sheriff Smith. This is the California equivalent of an impeachment proceeding for a local official. She must appear in court to answer the indictments. If she wishes to contest them, a trial will be held. However, the only penalty she will face if found guilty is removal from office.

As per custom, the local DA has recused himself from the case. Taking his place will be the infamous Soros-sponsored San Francisco DA Chesa Boudin who will handle the prosecution. Boudin is not fan of law enforcement.

KRON reports the charges against Smith as follows:

  • Count 1: Illegally issuing concealed carry weapon permits (CCW) to VIP’s
  • Count 2: Failing to properly investigate whether non-VIP’s should receive CCW permits
  • Count 3: Keeping non-VIP CCW applications pending indefinitely
  • Count 4: Illegally accepting suite tickets, food, and drinks at Sharks game
  • Count 5: Failing to report Sharks game gifts on financial documents
  • Count 6: Committing perjury by failing to disclose Sharks game gifts
  • Count 7: Failing to cooperate with internal affairs investigation surrounding treatment of Andrew Hogan

Note that Counts 1 to 3 all involve the issuance of concealed carry permits. Her behavior makes the case that may-issue concealed carry permits and their issuance are ripe for corruption. As reported last year, if you were a big donor to Sheriff Smith, you had a 79% chance of getting your permit. If, however, you did not contribute to her campaign, you success rate was a mere 5.5%. While this is better than San Francisco, it is still abysmal.

Sheriff Smith has been in office since December 1998. While California sheriff’s elections are officially non-partisan, it is reported that she is a Republican.

Under California law, even if she is booted from office, Smith would not lose her pension. Public officials can only lose their pension benefits if convicted of a felony and only from the date of the commission of the felony. A rough estimate of her pension is $266,000 annually based upon her last reported salary of $296,000. As I said this is a rough estimate and her actual retirement pay is probably considerably more. Other than avoiding the public shame of being removed from office, she has nothing really to lose by continuing in office. That said, if I were 69 years old like her, I’d have already retired.

UPDATE: NBC Bay Area has more on the case with Santa Clara County DA Jeff Rosen who has recused himself from the case.

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Duped Or Didn’t Care?

December 6, 2019 by 2 Comments

After I posted about the indictment of Rep. Movita Johnson-Harrell for theft from her own charity, I began to wonder about her campaign finances. One of the charges against her included failing to file a campaign finance report. What I found was interesting.

Johnson-Harrell was quoted in a fawning story by the Philadelphia Inquirer on her motivation to run for office as saying this:

“I ran because we need the bodies to stop dropping in every city across the nation,” said Johnson-Harrell, 53. “It’s our responsibility as legislators and leaders to do this.”

She made “gun violence” (sic) and gun control a centerpiece of her campaign in the special election. She was already known for having started the Charles Foundation to advocate for more gun control in memory of her murdered son. She was also the Vice Chair of Heeding God’s Call to Eliminate Gun Violence (sic). Thus, it was reasonable to assume she would get support from the gun prohibitionists.

And she did with a stirring endorsement from Everytown.

“After more than a dozen Moms Demand Action volunteers won elected office in 2018, I’m so excited to see yet another strong candidate emerge from our grassroots army of volunteers,” said Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America. “Movita Johnson-Harrell has been invaluable to our Pennsylvania chapter and I have no doubt that she’ll be an incredible leader at the statehouse, too.”

Endorsements are nice but modern campaigns run on money.

  • $500 – Ceasefire PA PAC
  • $250 – Shira Goodman, Executive Director, Ceasefire PA
  • $100 – Shawn Kraemer, President, Ceasefire PA
  • $100 – Bryan Miller, founder, Heeding God’s Call

Johnson-Harrell also received a $1,000 donation from Dana Bazelon of the Soros-bought Philadelphia DA’s Office and a $5,000 donation from the Committee for a Better Tomorrow which is the PAC for the Pennsylvania trial lawyers. She also received substantial donations from a variety of union-affiliated political action committees.

Johnson-Harrell’s financial issues were not a secret. Before she got the nomination by the Philadelphia Democratic Committee, she was grilled on her finances by ward leaders. Moreover, she only got the nomination because the more established candidates had issues with residency.

Going back to the headline, were those anti-gun stalwarts who donated to Johnson-Harrell duped by her? Or, could it have been that despite her known troubled finances, her fur coats, and her Porsche, they just didn’t care because they knew they would have a gun control advocate in Harrisburg? Would it have been, “Yeah, she’s a thief but she’s our thief” and the optics of having an African-American, Muslim woman who had family members murdered outweighed every thing else?

I doubt we will ever know and I know we would not get an honest answer if we asked.

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Another Corrupt Anti-Gun Politician Indicted

December 5, 2019 by 6 Comments

Pennsylvania State Rep. Movita Johnson-Harrell (D-Philadelphia) was indicted yesterday on charges stemming from her theft of over $500,000 from a charity she founded.

The Philadelphia Inquirer details Johnson-Harrell’s anti-gun activism in this story.

Alyssa Biederman, Philadelphia Inquirer

The AP notes:

Johnson-Harrell, the first female Muslim member of the House, came to office with the intensely personal story of having endured the shooting deaths of her father, brother, cousin and 18-year-old son. She campaigned on a platform of ending gun violence, and is active in an anti-gun violence foundation named for her son Charles, who was shot to death in 2011.

The criminal complaint against Rep. Johnson-Harrell lists a variety of charges against her. They include two counts of theft by unlawful taking, theft by deception, perjury, two counts of tampering with public records, and reporting by candidates and political committees. 

In announcing the charges, Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro (D-PA) said:

Shapiro said the defendant personally spent more than $500,000 from Motivations Education & Consultation Associates, or MECA, on vacations, designer clothing, luxury car payments, real estate purchases, past-due mortgage payments, and other personal expenses.

“When corruption erodes the trust that is built between governmental entities and citizens, no one wins,” Shapiro said. “I’ve said time and time again as Attorney General that no one is above the law, no matter their position of power. And today is no different.”

“Representative Johnson-Harrell continuously diverted Medicaid and social security disability funds from her charity to help Philadelphia’s most vulnerable communities for her own personal use. She spent almost $15,000 on clothing, including online shopping sprees at Ralph Lauren and fox fur coats. She traveled to Mexico, Orlando, Georgia and Maryland on lavish trips costing $16,000 of MECA funds,” Attorney General Shapiro said. “She spent $2,000 on overdue car payments on her Porsche. Another $4,000 on tuition for a relative. And, she spent almost $20,000 on overdue mortgage payments.”

Johnson-Harrell earned a salary of $89,000 while serving in the Pennsylvania General Assembly and had left a job with the Philadelphia DA’s Office as a victim’s advocate which paid $104,000 yearly. It is reported that her thefts from MECA continued while she was working for the DA’s Office as well as in her elected position.

According to her official legislative biography, Johnson-Harrell was a community college graduate who went on to earn both undergraduate and graduate degrees from Ivy League University of Pennsylvania. Reading between the lines, with an age of 53 and her high school diploma date of 1997, she was an adult student when she completed her education. For someone her age, her high school graduation normally would have been in the 1984-85 time period.

Johnson-Harrell was elected in a special election in March to replace Rep. Vanessa Lowery Brown (D-Philadelphia). Rep. Brown resigned from office in December 2018 after being sentenced for bribery and other charges. The Attorney General’s Office says Johnson-Harrell will be pleading guilty and will resign from office effective December 13th.

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TV Ad Execs And Political Consultants Are Saying Hallelujah!

November 24, 2019 by 2 Comments

Move over Tom Steyer. There is another narcissist Democrat billionaire who wants to be President.

From a report in the Wall Street Journal.

Billionaire Michael Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York City, said he would join the Democratic presidential race despite facing a tough path to the nomination in a crowded 2020 field.

Mr. Bloomberg’s advisers have been drawing up plans to build his campaign staff, intending to focus on the delegate-rich Super Tuesday states, which vote on March 3.

Many of the Democratic candidates have invested fewer resources in those states than in the first few nominating contests in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.

The primary beneficiaries of Bloomberg’s largess would seem to be advertising executives and political consultants as he plans to spend big.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg plans to spend over $100 million on his campaign.

Ahead of his announcement, Mr. Bloomberg said he would spend $100 million on digital ads against Mr. Trump and another $15 million to $20 million on registering new voters.

He had also begun assembling a big staff for his campaign-in-waiting that was working out of the offices of Bloomberg Philanthropies, which oversees the former mayor’s charitable giving, according to a person familiar with the matter.

While the many media stories on Bloomberg’s presidential run mention his wealth, none so far mention gun control. However, Bloomberg himself does list that as one of the issues he will address in his campaign. It is number three on the list on his campaign website.

With all the money that Bloomberg plans to spread around, perhaps the gaggle of corrupt MAIG mayors will seek some of it in return for campaign support. That way then they can stop indulging in public corruption like the former mayor of Baltimore.

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Another Illegal Bloomberg Mayor

November 23, 2019 by 1 Comment

Yet another member of Mayor Bloomberg’s Illegal Mayors has been arrested. Muncie, Indiana Mayor Dennis Tyler was arrested by the FBI on Monday for accepting a $5,000 bribe to steer a public works contract.

From the Muncie Star-Press:

The 76-year-old Tyler was indicted last Wednesday by a U.S. District Court grand jury on a count of theft of public funds. The indictment was then sealed, setting the stage for the mayor’s arrest by FBI agents Monday morning at his northside Muncie home.

“Public officials are entrusted to perform a public service and to legitimately conduct business in the best interest of the community that they represent,” U.S. Attorney Josh Minkler said Monday. “Tyler not only betrayed the trust of his community, but violated federal law, and all in an effort to serve his own personal interests.

“My office intends to prosecute Tyler to the full extent of the law.”

The FBI has been investigating corruption in the Muncie mayor’s office and the sanitation department since 2016. Seven others have been indicted since them for taking bribes, kickbacks, wire fraud, and other Federal charges.

As a side note, you would have had to wait until the 29th and final paragraph in the story to learn that Tyler was a Democrat.