20 May 2010

shock: a parish district attorney prosecutes an elected official criminal

via: sammy hanna's rethug propaganda rag:

excerpt:

Waterproof Mayor Bobby Higginbotham was jailed Wednesday following his conviction of malfeasance in office and felony theft.

He will be sentenced on June 24th by Judge John Crigler, who ordered that Higginbotham be held without bond because he was considered a flight risk. The judge said Higginbotham had missed several court hearings in the past.

Higginbotham was convicted by a six-person jury. He was represented by attorney Sandra Jenkins of New Orleans. Four witnesses, including himself, were called during his defense.

He faces a maximum of five years on the charge of malfeasance in office and a maximum of 10 years for felony theft.

Asst. Dist. Atty. Linda Watson said the judge ordered a partial mistrial on a count of public contract fraud due a recording error, but that charge can be brought up again.

"We felt we had a strong case," said Watson, "The entire town council testified against him as well as employees of the Town of Waterproof. We did expect a guilty verdict." ~ read more
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in this case you should consider that the likely reason that the parish district attorney prosecuted the mayor rather than waiting for the feds to get wind of it, was because the crimes were too huge for the d.a. to suppress and cover-up; word had gotten around and too many people in the tiny town of waterproof, louisiana knew about it, so the district attorney had no choice.
"district attorneys in the state dont have a good track record of prosecuting politicians for wrong-doing and they just dont do it and so the feds have to do it -- thank goodness we have somebody -- but the district attorneys have jurisdiction over all of this.

the district attorney could have prosecuted the jefferson's for ripping off the state. they dont. thats one of the reasons that this (corruption) is so prolific around the state is the fact that there is no scrutiny by the state and there is no prosecution by the local district attorneys."

~ louisiana political blogger and attorney c.b. forgotston 26 february 2010 on the moon griffon show

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Posted by wst... at 16:17