At Blitch's direction, Leccese had paid more than $60,000 in supplemental wages to himself, his deputy clerk and a deputy sheriff, county commission vice chairman Barry Hart told the Daily Report in July. Those fees were paid for administering a county program that had been outsourced to a private business in 2001, Hart said.
Hart told the Daily Report in July that Blitch has routinely withheld funds from traffic fines, some of which should have flowed into county coffers, and doled those funds out to courthouse offices.
The feds wound up nailing several public employees in the case. From an FBI press release:
In prosecutions connected with this matter one sheriff, a court clerk, and a Clinch CountyState/Juvenile Court Judge, in addition to other individuals, have pled guilty to criminal charges, as well.
We do have one concern about the Blitch case. The prosecution was initiated by a Bush-appointed U.S. attorney, and Blitch is a member of a prominent Democratic family. That raises the specter of a prosecution that was politically motivated--and that is unlawful.
As we have written previously, judicial corruption is not a partisan issue limited only to Republicans. I've witnessed sleazy Democrats on the bench myself.
The Justice Department should be investigating all Bush-era prosecutions that had political overtones, to make sure they were conducted properly. Based on what we know so far, it appears that citizens are better off without Jack Camp and Brooks Blitch on the bench.
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