Ecce maggot.
Posted on 11/19/2008 6:37:38 PM PST by Coleus
Former senator Wayne R. Bryant was found guilty yesterday of selling his office as one of New Jersey's most influential lawmakers for a medical school job that padded his pension, in a case that also put on trial the secret political horse-trading of the state budget process. A federal jury in Trenton convicted Bryant of bribery for soliciting a job at the School of Osteopathic Medicine in Camden County and using his influence to help the school acquire $10.5 million in state grants between 2003 and 2006.
The jury also found Bryant, 61, of Lawnside, guilty of 11 counts of mail and wire fraud stemming from the scheme to land the $35,000-a-year "low-work" job at the school, run by the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. Prosecutors said Bryant used the mail to apply for the job, get paid, and file a financial disclosure form for 2003 that omitted his UMDNJ job -- all in an effort to defraud the state Division of Pensions and Benefits. U.S. Attorney Christopher Christie, who leaves office next month, said that of the 132 public corruption convictions his office has won, the Bryant case may be the most significant.
"The brazen arrogance of Wayne Bryant -- to believe that he was completely beyond the reach of the law, to extort state institutions for personal profit in return for the funding of good and worthwhile programs that serve the poor, the disadvantaged and the needy of our state -- is simply the most disgusting conduct I've seen by a public official in my seven years as U.S. attorney," Christie said.
A long fall for once-powerful lawmaker
Full coverage in The Star-Ledger
(Excerpt) Read more at nj.com ...
Wayne was probably the inspiration for State Senator Clay Davis on “The Wire.”
Ecce maggot.
Paging William Jefferson, please pick up the prison-striped courtesy phone....
Let me guess....DEMOCRAT???
DUH...just saw it in the HEADLINE....amazing....don’t ever expect it there!
AH....YOU changed the newspaper headline!!!! It really reads....
EX-lawmaker Wayne Bryant is found guilty of bribery
Most people want criminal politicians in jail where they belong but some people don’t care! It is always someone else’s fault.
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The Bryant name is omnipresent in the Camden County town. Wayne Bryant’s brother, Mark, is the mayor. Around the block is the Wayne R. Bryant Community Center. Even the map has Bryant markings: I.R. Bryant Way, named after his father, a former school board president, and Spicer Place, named for his wife, Cheryl Spicer.
For those in Bryant’s corner, skepticism abounds about why the senator was investigated in the first place.
“You don’t know what’s behind this,” Foster said. “He probably ruffled somebody’s feathers and they said, ‘Hey, I’ll get you.’ “
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