What figures largest in these personal narratives is the belief that they were wrongly prosecuted. If anything, they had been punished simply for doing things the Albany way. 'But everyone was doing it,' is the argument of jailed Albany ex-legislators! “I wouldn’t say they were crooks. Everybody does all that,. It’s, ‘I help you, you help me.’ So what is that?" asks ex-State Senator Gonzalez. "Politics?” No! What that is, sir, is unethical and illegal, which is why you are in jail. "I don’t want to die being known as‘Disgraced senator.’” says another. “It doesn’t weigh on me that there’s this opinion of me, because it’s not true,” said ex-Assemblyman Will Boyland Jr,-- serving a 14-year sentence " “I don’t have that thing where I’m a criminal, so I’m smiling,” says ex-State Senator Efraín González Jr. These men are in for a prolonged humbling.
At www.nytimes.com
