Six years after a bizarre tale of political retribution, two former aides of ex-Governor Chris Christie (R-NJ) have had their convictions thrown out by the Supreme Court.
The unanimous decision was a sharp rebuke to prosecutors.
CNBC has more:
The Supreme Court on Thursday reversed the fraud convictions of two aides to former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie who played key roles the “Bridgegate” scandal, which involved shutting down commuter lanes at the George Washington Bridge in order to punish the city of Fort Lee’s mayor for refusing to back Christie’s 2013 reelection effort.
Justice Elena Kagan wrote for the unanimous court that the two aides, Bridget Anne Kelly and William Baroni, “could not have violated the federal-program fraud or wire fraud laws” because the scheme did not “aim to obtain money or property.
Kelly was Christie’s Deputy Chief of Staff and Baroni was Deputy Executive Director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. The scandal has been seen as a death blow to the political career of Christie, who had hoped to leverage his second term as governor into a successful run for the Republican presidential nomination.
Kagan wrote that the evidence “no doubt shows wrongdoing — deception, corruption, abuse of power.”
But she added that such conduct was not criminal.
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Well done US Supremes. Bridget Anne Kelly was railroaded as a scapegoat.
Again, a wrong was not punished. Just because no money was obtained does not mean that Christie was not evil and corrupt. And yes, I am a Republican. But I don’t like bad guys no matter what party they belong to. The pawns got out. Good. Christie did not turn this into a successful POTUS bid. GOOD.
So the minions of politicians can engage in wrongdoing, deceive, be corrupt and abuse their power…….. but as far as Elena Kagan is concerned….. no harm, no foul? That clears it up.
Apparently you did not comprehend the Judges decision. RE-READ it! You Ignorant Jack-AZZ!
Murkypolo: Since you seem to know little about hoe the Supreme Court works, they are not responsible for indicting and convicting wrong doing. They are here to adjudicate whether the case before them meets the law under which they were charged whether the outcome was constitutional. To have a unanimous decision from the 4 far left justices and Kagan present the argument is testament to this process as well as the invalidation of the judgement presented to them.
Idiot. She did not say “no foul”. She said the law used did not apply. Too bad that Democrats have never studied law. And no, it was not right that Christie pulled this stunt. But it failed. And that is good. And now YOU have failed.
Justice was served. Christie, the fake conservative, did not become POTUS.
Where is the punishment for the individuals that perpetrated this injustice.
Im sure they are all democrats.
This crap will never end unless there is punishment.
Sadly, these fcking prosecutors have created a great system of un-accountability for themselves. Same goes for the “few” corrupt Judges in America ( mostly Democrats, I presume).
This is a terrible decision by the Supreme Court. And I’m a conservative! How can you turn around and say in your decision that the politicians engaged in corruption and abuse of power, and leave the citizenry no way to punish them? We the citizens cannot issue a warning to corrupt politicians review is power if we don’t have the power to punish them.
And if you are a liberal you can’t sit there and blame the conservative court because this decision was 9-0. That means even the liberals, even Ruth Bader Ginsburg agreed with Clarence Thomas.
The Judges were CORRECT! Re-READ the decision! Idiot.
Your a little bully bad mouth. People like you make me sick. You are a dirt bag.
The citizens have the power of voting them out of office or do a recall.
That does not work. Because the ignorant fcking Democrats keep electing them.
Not a bad decision.
An accurate one. The law used specified that the action had to have been taken for financial advantage. IT WAS NOT.
Next time, get a prosecutor who can read.
Where is the long comment i just wrote & clicked on “post”?
I don’t know. But that really SUCKS!
i suggest that (as I certainly do) you save all comments in a text file in case of this happening. Many of my posts get moderated and then never appear. I don’t particularly care except that I put a lot of myself in every comment even if I only offer a pun. So, it’s like a journal, that growing text file. I often can post that comment on other boards dealing with the same subject matter. BTW, Epstein didn’t kill himself, etc.
It sounds confusing, that (one of the charges) ‘abuse of power’ is not criminal, but Justice Kagan would’ve had to write for a mile to explain to dunderheads that the charge did not fit and the prosecutors are rebuked by the Supreme Court with that sentence. – that case was never about any wrongdoing by Christie or his folks, it was all about the prosecution overreach and enjoying trampling the Bill of Rights of Christie’s assistants – that banana finally reached the US Supreme Court for the prosecutors to slip on NINE against them TO ZERO for them.
I would like to know why is no-one looking into what DR. Judy Mikovits is saying about Fauchi.
There are many scientist backing her story. Facebook keeps taking her conferences down.News media won’t report what she has to report to us about covid
So a person can get away with Corruption,Deception, and Abuse of Power and those particular offenses are not considered as “Criminal” now I understand Hillary , Obama and the rest of the Democratic Party
Their actions may or may not be criminal, but that is not the point. They were charged and convicted for OTHER crimes that they did NOT commit. If someone broke into your house and stole your TV, but were arrested and convicted for stealing your car instead of being charged with burglary of your house, that conviction would be wrong and could not stand.
The “aim” was not of money or property, therefore it did not meet the standard set by federal laws as to fraud, so therefore it was not considered “criminal”. “evidence “”No doubt shows wrong doing, deceprion, corruption, abuse of power” but she (Justice Elena Kagan) added that such conduct was not criminal.”
I understand the Federal Law as to Fraud. But as to the rest which Justice Kagan calls “not criminal” is puzzling. So I guess perhaps she is saying the prosecutors need to go back to see what Law was broken and charge the two with the appropriate Law. Or maybe not.
SO justice kagan writes that wrongdoing, deception, corruption, and abuse of power because such conduct is not criminal. Well then what the hell…the phony impeachment circus of President Trump should be thrown out has well. APPLY THE LAW EQUALLY OR GET OFF THE BENCH FOR DERELICTION OF DUTY!
Now exactly where this judge got that deception, corruption are not crimes than a lot of persons should be set free who are in prison for a long time for those crimes.
‘Prosecutorial’ screw-up, charged with the ‘wrong-crime’, & the dog must’ve eaten the ‘paper-work’? And, was the judge in the lower court awake during trial?
Kagan is a LIBERAL judge exonerating Republican officials. Is that decision just for good will towards Liberals ? If not explain WHY.
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