I read this and noticed all of these county commissioners are being tried in federal court. Do any of you legal eagles know under what provision the feds can have the power to regulate a purely local matter like this?
If he used any federal money in his state government, which is likely, then it becomes a federal matter and can be tried in federal court. I also think that congress has granted itself pretty strong anti-corruption powers that have not been challenged by SCOTUS, and probably wont be because of federal money or resources involved.
Also, the state can request federal resources and work with federal prosecutors for a federal trial. I think thats what happened with Blago in Illinois.
The federal hook in such cases is that its almost impossible to conduct any sort of fraud without using either the mail or interstate telecommunications, which is why such conduct is often described as “mail fraud” or “wire fraud”. The underlying “crime” in this particular case, for which the mail and telecom were used, was “honest services fraud”, a concept that many have derided as unfairly nebulous.
Also you can see the limits of the commerce clause by a SCOTUS ruling here:
These cases are usually handled by the Public Integrity Section of the U.S. Department of Justice: http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/pin/
18 U.S.C. 201(a) is very broadly worded:
[T]he term “public official” means Member of Congress, Delegate, or Resident Commissioner, either before or after such official has qualified, or an officer or employee or person acting for or on behalf of the United States, or any department, agency or branch of Government thereof, including the District of Columbia, in any official function, under or by authority of any such department, agency, or branch of Government, or a juror… (emphasis added) http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode18/usc_sec_18_00000201----000-.html
Elendil, that section covers only federal government employees and functions. The violation here is of 18 U.S.C. 1346, “honest services fraud”: