The Miami Herald's Dan Christensen writes about State Attorney Michael Satz choosing not to charge Broward County Commissioner Stacy Ritter with corruption counts -- despite strong evidence that she voted on matters that enriched her husband, the lobbyist Russ Klenet.
It provides further evidence that Keith Wasserstrom was basically a one-time sacrifice and that Satz is back to his disgusting practice of excusing political corruption while loading up both barrels on the poorest sector of our society.
Christensen broke the story about her conflict with voting machine maker ES&S and I broke the initial stories about her conflicts of interest with airport manager URS and Vista health. I've been busy with another project and haven't seen the closeout memo, but Christensen writes that Satz dropped the URS case because she abstained from voting.
To understand what garbage that is, read this.
In other news about top public officials who absolutely suck, Judge Joan Lenard's second go at the Liberty City Seven (now Liberty City Six) ended in another mistrial in Miami. She should have gotten the clue the first time that this was a total farce of a case brought on by political pressure to show a homeland victory in the Bush Administration's ill-advised War on Terror. There is more going on here that I'll be writing about later, but now it's safe to say that this has been a huge black eye for the FBI, the Bush Administration, and Joan Lenard. Give it up, Joan.
Lenard and Satz -- two arguments for why a free press is still America's last hope.
