Justice denied
Paxton joins the ranks of wealthy and well-connected who avoid the rule of law.
Justice has become the latest victim in Hurricane Harvey.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s trial for violating state securities laws has been moved until at least early 2018. The Harris County Criminal Justice Center simply suffered too much damage from the epic storm to handle the case in time.
Yet Mother Nature has competition for delaying justice.
Paxton’s top-notch attorneys have exploited every legal trick from Plano to Houston and back to protect their client from facing a fair trial for violating state securities laws. Meanwhile, the special prosecutors — hired by the state to ensure that rule of law applies to even the attorney general — have had to fight to receive a mere paycheck. The Court of Criminal Appeals should weigh-in on the matter and get these attorneys paid at the agreed-upon rate.
Paxton allegedly solicited clients for a friend’s investment company without properly registering with the state, and also defrauded investors. He faces up to 99 years in prison.
Texans deserve to know whether our top lawman is a crook. At this rate — after three delays — we won’t get an answer until at least next Republican Party primary race.
As we’ve said before, an attorney general preoccupied with defending himself cannot focus on his duties to the state. And Paxton’s shady legal donation fund has only multiplied the criminal woes. He’s now being investigated for accepting a $100,000 gift from the CEO of a company that the state was scrutinizing for fraud. How long until the prosecutors add bribery to the list of indictments?
Texas’ attorney general should save us all from this ongoing scandal and resign from office.
But do you really think that’s going to happen? The well-connected and wealthy get to play by a different set of rules, and Paxton’s not the only one.
A shocking investigation by ProPublica revealed that New York prosecutors spent two years preparing a fraud case against Donald Trump’s two eldest children, Ivanka Trump and Donald Trump Jr., for misleading investors. In 2012, their attorney, Marc Kasowitz, donated $25,000 to the reelection campaign of Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. Kasowitz then visited the DA’s office and, three months later, Vance told his prosecutors to drop the case.
The Manhattan DA also faces allegations of dropping sexual assault charges against Hollywood studio executive Harvey Weinstein in 2015 after receiving a $10,000 campaign donation.
From California to New York City and deep in the heart of Texas, the rich and powerful find a way to avoid the consequences of the law.
It didn’t used to be so brazen. As Pro Publica reporter Jesse Eisinger revealed in his book, “The Chickenshit Club,” over the course of the 21st century, federal prosecutors have simply stopped going after the people who sit at the top of the economic food chain. CEOs have become “job creators.” The allure of highly paid white-collar defense work keeps prosecutors in line. Ambitious lawyers who fill the Justice Department don’t want to be seen as the bad guy in their upper-class social circle.
The age of the Enron trial is over. Now we live in a country where banker subterfuge brought the global economy to the brink in the 2008 financial crisis and nobody went to jail.
The wealthy get concierge service. Everyone else suffers through an assembly line courtroom that keeps people behind bars not based on their threat to society, but whether they can afford a cash bond.