This explains why Philly DA harshly attacked AG Kane - they were rivals for US Senate
Last edited Fri Feb 20, 2015, 01:33 PM - Edit history (3)
When AG Kane was doing well at first, she was being talked about as a possible Dem candidate for US Senate. Now it turns out that Phila DA Seth Williams wants to run for the US Senate.
http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/capitolinq/Seth-Williams-for-Senate.html
Soon after Kane took office, Corbett's right hand man as AG (Fina) started public attacks on her, alleging that she had not filed criminal charges based upon Fina's attempt to run a sting against 4 African-American Philadelphia officials for taking unreported cash and a bracelet.
(By the way, under State law, it was highly questionable whether the gifts were actually illegal, because PA. law is so weak on the issue. Legislators are allowed to take briefcases full of cash, as long as they are not caught doing anything in return, and as long as they report it. If they fail to report it, it is only a misdemeanor. Corbett was caught "forgetting" to report some of his gifts.)
Two previous Republican AGs had also not pressed charges based upon Fina's sting. Kane considered the lobbyist who ran the sting to be untrustworthy and uncooperative with her. Kane also said the sting seemed to be racially motivated.
Fina and his buddies also tried to bribe a single white legislator who, by sheer coincidence, was an outspoken critic of Corbett, but that legislator turned them away.
What was strange was that Phila. DA Seth Williams then hired Fina and Kane's other critics. Williams was then surprisingly outspoken in publicly attacking Kane in a very harsh manner. The extreme harshness of William's public statements was surprising, considering both Williams and Kane are Democrats, and that Philadelphia is such a Democratic city, and that the persons targeted in the sting were Democrats.
Williams then moved forward on plea bargains based upon Fina's sting operation.
Was Williams so harshly critical because he trying to kill Kane's chances of running for the Senate?
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At the same time, Kane has repeatedly shot herself in the foot by repeatedly making public statements that were not true. She is facing charges of allegedly leaking secret information from a Grand Jury. She has no chance of being re-elected.
By the way, the very first thing Kane did when she took office was to confiscate the hard drive of Fina's office computer. Before Kane took office, the Republicans tried to wipe clean the email system of the Attorney General's office, but a sharp techie was able to recover the info.
