Corruption

GREENSBORO, N.C. - Attorneys hammered at the credibility of John Edwards and his once-trusted aide as arguments in his campaign corruption trial ended Thursday, leaving jurors to decide whether the presidential candidate's sex scandal cover-up amounted to a crime or a litany of lies. Jurors begin deliberations Friday on six counts of campaign finance fraud that could send Edwards to prison for up to 30 years. They will weigh whether to believe Edwards' arguments that he didn't knowingly break the law when he sought to cover up an affair with his pregnant mistress, or his aide, Andrew Young, who said Edwards recruited him to use secret donations from wealthy donor to hide the affair.

If Cinnaminson had a navy, the admirals would boast about winning medals even as crew members got tossed in the brig. Amid a corruption probe that led to the arrests of a supervisor and assistant supervisor of the township Sewerage Authority, five other employees and three private citizens, the authority's board of commissioners received and eagerly announced a "Wave Achievement Award" from the statewide Association of Environmental Authorities....

HARRISBURG — Former longtime House Democratic leader Bill DeWeese on Monday began serving a 2½- to five-year prison term for corruption. DeWeese, 62, reported to Dauphin County Prison about 1 p.m., a half-hour ahead of the court-ordered deadline, officials said. "I just want to say three things. One, I'm going to behave myself and obviously conform to the protocols of the institution; two, I'm going to stay in tip-top physical condition; and third and finally, I'm going to make some new friends," DeWeese told WHTM-TV.

If this is the future waiting for me, I don't want it. " Spoken by a young girl, those words close Niños Incómodos (Bothersome Children), a video released last week in Mexico to shock, objection, and controversy. It's a viral sensation with more than 2.7 million views. It has drugs, corruption, violence - and all the actors are children. In the opening, a little boy playing a businessman shuts off his alarm and (in a scene one congressman called "unacceptable") takes a drag on his morning cigarette.

RE: Stu Bykofsky's column about his health: I have taken it upon myself as a mission to inform my friends for the last couple of years about going to the ER. If you feel something abnormal, go. It's best to get a battery of tests and get a follow-up referral than not address the feeling at all. Thank you for encouraging the men of our age (I'm 55)! This will save lives! Michael Black Philadelphia In the minority Re: James Lynch's letter about the article on minority contracting: You accuse the article of not offering an explanation for the lack of minority contractors.

HARRISBURG - With the approach of his sentencing on corruption charges, State Rep. Bill DeWeese took to the House floor Tuesday to bid farewell to the chamber where he has served for more than three decades and which he, for a time, ruled. DeWeese, a Democrat and former House speaker, has continued to represent his Southwestern Pennsylvania district since his conviction in February on corruption charges, but the law bars him from remaining in office after his April 24 sentencing. The House meets this week for the last time before that day, which is also the date of the Pennsylvania primary.

Did you hear the latest joke about New Jersey? A group of investigative journalists released a report calling it the least corruptible state in the country. How did that happen? Easy. We bribed them. All kidding aside, this is a state where in 2009, three mayors, two assemblymen, and five rabbis were among 44 charged by the FBI in a single money-laundering and bribery stin. One mayor, Peter Cammarano, was from Hoboken, where I live. Five years before his arrest, another former Hoboken mayor, Anthony Russo, pleaded guilty to corruption charges.

New Jersey deserves its recent accolades for improving its ethical climate. Of course, you have to put the honors in perspective, considering the state's long swim in the cesspool of political corruption. Reacting to a string of scandals, the Legislature has passed tough ethics laws and put some muscle behind them. That's how it beat every other state in a comprehensive audit of ethics laws and enforcement conducted by the Center for Public Integrity, Public Radio International, and Global Integrity.

Judges: Ex-leader took payments DUBLIN, Ireland - Former Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern received at least $276,000 in secret payments while in office and repeatedly lied about it under oath, a mammoth fact-finding judicial investigation ruled Thursday. The three judges led by Justice Alan Mahon stopped short of finding Ahern guilty of corruption, because they couldn't prove that Ahern gave favors to any of his cash donors when he was finance minister in the 1990s. The judges did find two other former lawmakers in Ahern's Fianna Fail party guilty of corruption for soliciting payments from property developers for personal use. They also found 11 past and present 11 members of local councils guilty of the same offense.

State governments lack transparency and accountability to citizens and remain at high risk for corruption, according to a new study of all 50 statehouses. The state doing the best? New Jersey. Not a single state received an A in the State Integrity Investigation ranking, a product of the Center for Public Integrity, Public Radio International, and Global Integrity. "It's telling that no state received an overall grade of A," said Caitlin Ginley, a staff writer for the Center for Public Integrity and a project manager on the study.