Perhaps some justice for DiMasi and friends
Three Beacon Hill power brokers and former House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi have been indicted on corruption charges today in connection with a State House scandal involving software contracts, according to court records.
DiMasi, his former accountant Richard Vitale, lobbyist Richard McDonough and software broker Joseph Lally have been indicted, records state. The U.S. Attorney’s Office has called a press conference for 3:30 today to announce “a public corruption matter.”
Also DiMasi's top attorney Lou Rizoli is resigning at the end of this month. This could also have a bearing on Cahill's connections to the lobbyists for the software company, in that Cahill has denied any ethical wrong doing in awarding the contract..
This story has legs.
posted by Jim Pillsbury @ 3:39 PM
13 Comments
13 Comments:
And on another bright spot, State Pension people have ordered that two BRA (Boston Redevelopment Authority) big wigs to repay over 400,000 in pay that was overpaid and in violation of post retirement income.
State Law prohibits retirees from working as an employee, contractor or consultant for more than 960 hours a year and from collecting more in income that the salary for the position they held at retirement.
I wonder how many more they will find that are gaming the system.
The only justice will be when our jails are full of our politicians. Maybe let the criminals run the state and put the politicians in the jails. Can not be any worse than what we have now.
You predicted this months ago Jim. Guess you were right on target. The one thing I don't get is did they think they would get away with this, that no one would find out, or did they think what they got for money was worth the price they will pay? If that later is the case, then we need to revamp our judicial system so that the price you pay is high enough to deter you from doing the misdeed. Isn't that the purpose of having penalties for illedgal behavior?
Jim how does the system work as far as checks and balances at the state house? What sort of system is in place to prevent this kind of blatent abuse, and where did it fail? Time to stop throwing up our hands and saying another corrupt politician and start policing them to make sure this is not going on still.
Do you think the new speaker is tied in to any of this stuff? He was sort of the annointed of DeMasi, right? Makes me wonder how ethical he is. Will be interesting to see who else is involved in this. Seems to me I remember Richardson telling us how important it was for her to establish relationships with others at the State House, and how she was in DeMasi’s inner circle. Do you think she will be bragging about that now in her news letter? In any case, it shows her poor judgement in supporting someone who we have all known for a while was doing illegal stuff. Of course she is not alone in having supported him, but as my mother always said, two wrongs don’t make a right.
As of now, the Senate has cut out the important parts of the Ethics Reform package to deal with gifts. Unless Deval gets his way and has ALL the reforms he and many of residents have demanded, this type of back door bribery will continue.
It's taken much longer than I would have thought for the Feds to indite, but I'm certain they have done their best. That being said, I believe there will be more fall out from this, perhaps including others at the State House. I'm not on the list of "need to know" so it's just speculation. DeLeo has complied with all inquires from the Fed's and he's not mentioned in any reports that I've read about... but as you all know, it's a very cozy place where they work and it would not surprise me if DeLeo gets sucked in. He must be thinking... will I be 4 in a row?
I don’t thnik I would want to run for any position in this state at the moment. Seems that to be successful in the state house, you have to be corrupt. I am not corrupt, but if I were to run, then I think people would assume I was and I don’t want to be in that position. So how do we combat the fact that people don’t want to be viewed that way so they won’t run? And how do we combat the political money train that these reps and senators have built that assures them of unlimited funds when they run so they can just mow us down if we do try to run against one of the?
DeMasi is old news now. No longer an elected official, no longer running the show at the state house. I personally am not going to waste time with him. I am interested in the people still serving at the state house. Why is it that we take so long to catch on to the schemes these politicians are involved in?
6th... I would agree with your statements.. up until now I think the money they have and can raise would impede anyone's chances of winning, but not running.
But I have to believe, at this point in time, when the State House continues to play hide and seek, most reasonable people would have to wonder why they vote for such nonsense every year.
The plan would be for any person wanting to challenge the status quo, would be to start now, develop a blog or web site, and let voters know you are willing to take on the machine. I do believe, there are hundreds of normal sensible men and women who would do a better job representing us and while they may not have the financial backing from unions, big business and State workers, what they do have is honesty and integrity and that may well be the determining factor in next years races.
Only a hand full of Reps will be able to say, they didn't vote for DiMasi, the rest will have to defend themselves, in indefensible positions. There'll be no where to hide, no huge amounts of money to dangle and no excuses taken, why they haven't cleaned up Beacon Hill and it's members.
If there were a better time to run, I've not seen it yet. 2010 is the year of change and by then, our State will not look like it does today. The problems of mis management will only get worse and the tax increases will only be larger. Most people will be outraged and will demand change.
50... partially because we have allowed the elected elite to perform their duties behind closed doors and when we have asked for details, they have taken cover behind "right to know" laws that were designed to keep us in the dark.
DiMasi is this years poster child for reform, as was Finneran a few years ago, but this time, the State is in serious trouble and voters will be looking for justice.
Justice for a corrupt politician? Did you forget what state you live in? This is MA, our politicians do not ever have to face justice. Does the name Bulger ring a bell to you? We will never see a corrupt politician in MA pay the price the rest of us would have to pay if we did the same thing they did. The system is just so messed up it won't happen. We idolize our politicians, like they are all Kennedys, and they are certainly not all Kennedys. I am a democrat, but I am appalled at the behavior of my party in this state.
I wonder if there are more heads to fall on this also. And if there are, when will we find out about those? Seems that the unethical behavior is inbred at the state house which for me, leaves no one above suspicion.
Now we read that Deval and his crew may or may not have had knowledge of the contract. Although the Feds claim there are no more indictments associated with this, the close proximity and hand holding that has gone down around this may.... be enough to make a few resign in the coming weeks.
I wonder how many other contracts have been pushed through and who has benefited, both financially and politically. As you writers have pointed out... who among them can be trusted at this point, to make the right calls. Yesterday they defeated a proposal to stop the two days of hack holiday in Boston. A loss for us to the tune of 5 million a year.
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