Larry Langford, the mayor of Birmingham, Ala., was convicted on 60 counts of fraud, from bribery to criminal conspiracy, in a federal corruption trial Wednesday.
According to the New York Times, as president of the Jefferson County Commission, Langford received more than $230,000 worth of clothing, jewelry, and cash.
In exchange, Langford was to steer millions of dollars in county bonds to a prominent investment banker, William Blount. Putting these actions into context, Reuters reported that this corruption is linked to the county’s multimillion-dollar sewer debt, a case that helped push the county into what would be the biggest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history last year.
The charges also include mail and wire fraud. Automatically, under Alabama law, Langford will be disbarred from office, and Carole Smitherman, previously president of the City Council, took over immediately.
He faces life in prison and he will also have to give up $241,000, according to the Times.
Langford’s lawyers reportedly suggested that the gifts were donations from Blount, and that Langford has a spending problem, but that he is a good politician.
State Representative Patricia Todd said that there’s a need for a statewide ethics reform, the Times reported. “I hope that every elected official learns that you can’t accept these kinds of gifts without the person wanting something in return,” Todd told the Times. “Shame on him for violating the public trust and thinking he’s above the law.”
According to Reuters, the jury deliberated for less than three hours. Langford later asserted his innocence, saying “We all have our trials in life and this too shall pass.” He also claimed that the jury was swayed by the journalists and their reporting of the case.
“I am not the first person to go to trial for something I did not do,” he said. He plans to appeal the verdict.
Our Take:
I thought the prosecutor was right in saying that this is an old story that almost seems like a cliché, to me at least. I want to know why he thinks that he did commit these wrongdoings, because that’s what he claims, but what does he mean by that? Meanwhile, there is a lot of evidence against him, and it certainly does not look like a mere spending problem to go as far as to be accused of fraud.
