Corruption is here, there and almost anywhere

Corruption is here, there and almost anywhere

Mahoning County politics certainly has more than its share of incidents of corruption, but a couple of news stories in recent days show that this area hasn’t cornered the market.

It doesn’t in any way excuse any of those crooked politicians who have been in the headlines here over the years, but there’s some comfort in knowing that we’re not alone.

The first story comes from Orange, N.J., which we suppose shouldn’t be too much a surprise since Orange is right next to Newark, and five of Newark’s last seven mayors have faced criminal indictment. The other story is out of Providence, R.I., a city with its problems, to be sure, but one that operates better than most (witness that it’s twice as large as Youngstown, but had 11 homicides in 2006 — a year when Youngstown had 32).

In Orange, Mims Hackett Jr., a former lawmaker, resigned as mayor of Orange after pleading guilty to a federal corruption charge. Hackett admitted taking a $5,000 bribe to steer a city contract to an insurance broker. Unfortunately for Hackett, the broker was an undercover informant.

He is the latest among 125 New Jersey public employees to have pleaded guilty or been convicted of corruption since 2002. He also pleaded guilty to state charges of collecting more than $5,700 in fictitious meal expenses. He’s looking at 18 to 24 months in federal prison.

Guilt and innocence

The case out of Providence, the Rhode Island capital, has a different twist. There, former state Sen. John Celona, is serving a two-and-a-half year prison sentence after admitting to selling the influence of his office to CVS, Roger Williams Medical Center and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Rhode Island.

But when the two CVS executives accused of bribing Celona were tried, a jury acquitted them. The executives’ lawyers argued that Celona performed valuable services for the money CVS paid him and that the payments had nothing to do with the influence he wielded at the Rhode Island Statehouse. The jury found that argument more credible than Celona’s testimony about being bribed by the drugstore executives.

Two years ago, another jury found Celona’s testimony more credible and convicted two former hospital executives of hiring Celona to promote their legislative agenda. Those convictions were overturned earlier this year because of flawed jury instructions.

So while the politician who admitted selling himself is in jail, the guys who he said bought him are not only free, some of them are complaining about being treated unfairly by federal prosecutors.

Stamping out corruption is easier some places than others.