Corrupt Like A Senator

As you may know, former NY State Senate Majority Leader Joesph Bruno is on trial for fraud. There is one fact that has emerged from the trial that should anger any New Yorker.

Every year, Senators must fill out financial disclosure forms that are forwarded to the Senate Ethics Committee. Senators must list their outside business interests/income as well as any conflict of interests that they may have.

Now the State Senators have legal counsel that advise them on how to comply with the requirements.

Here is the fact that makes the blood boil: the lawyers for the Senate advised the Senators to have the completed disclosure forms hand-delivered to the Ethics Committee.

What's the big deal about hand delivering the damn forms?

Well, its huge. Every time the federal government brings a criminal case against a defendant, it has to show WHY IT HAS JURISDICTION OVER THE MATTER.

The feds typically use the fact that for financial crimes, a criminal defendant used the U.S. mail in committing/furthering the crime. It gives the feds the jurisdictional hook they need to bring the case.

Now it the Bruno case, the lawyer who advised the Senate testified that he advised the Senators to hand deliver the financial disclosures specifically because he wanted the feds not to have jurisdiction over the contents of the disclosures.

Think about that: they knew the disclosures were either false or misleading, and didn't want the feds to be able to carve out a case, so they hand delivered the forms instead using a conventional mailbox.

The level of corruption has reached toxic levels when politicians complete conflict of interest forms with the actual intent to avoid federal jurisdiction over the bull**it they admit on the forms.

Rise up, pitchfork brigades.