The federales caught up with Tommy “Taxes” Finneran, who was indicted today on three counts of perjury and one count of obstruction of justice.
This was in connection with his lying to a federal court about gerrymandering state legislative districts to favor white candidates, to the detriment of minority voters and taxpayers.
Finneran will, of course, escape the potential maximum 25 year sentence, the same as that other slippery pol, Billy Bulger, who has managed to stay out of jail in spite of his refusal to cooperate with the Feds in the apprehension of his gangster brother, “Whitey”.
Still, there is a measure of satisfaction in seeing the sleazey Finneran exposed to at least some small public humiliation.
Lest this incident cause some of us to regain even a sliver of faith in the system, though, leave it to our governor, the Presidential candidate, to rain on our parade by offering words of inappropriate mollification:
Gov. Mitt Romney said he was “very sorry to learn of the indictment.”
“While we disagreed on some fronts, I have always respected him and found him to be straightforward in all of his dealing with me,” Romney said in a statement.
Obviously, this big wet one was delivered to Finneran’s posterior not for his benefit, but in deference to his role as surrogate for the current Democratic leadership in the State House.
For the govahnah to feel he had to do this (as opposed to, say, keeping still) only proves how much of a joke he’s really become.
And we all had such hopes…..