Jay Heck Weighs in on the Jensen Verdict

Jay Heck of Common Cause in Wisconsin sent the press release below after a jury convicted former Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Scott Jensen of misconduct in office. Jay Heck can be reached at ccwisjwh@itis.com. I interviewed Jay Heck on Radio Commentary several months ago. That interview can be found here.

Press Release:

After nearly 18 hours of careful and thoughtful consideration of all the testimony and evidence, a jury of Wisconsin citizens has rendered a resounding verdict of guilty on all counts in the felony misconduct trial of Scott Jensen. This is the first time that citizens--real and normal people who are not Capitol insiders, political junkies or partisans with a direct interest in the outcome of this trial--have weighed in and had their voices heard in the so-called Legislative Caucus Scandal--the most serious and widespread political scandal in Wisconsin's history. And what they have said is signficant and clear: Scott Jensen violated the public trust in a manner profoudly detrimental to Wisconsin.

The jury agreed that this violation was massive, pervasive--occurring on a large scale over a long period of time. The jury said that the expenditure of hundreds of thousands--perhaps millions of taxpayer dollars to gain private, dishonest advantage is clearly not tolerable to the citizens of this state. This jury was able to distinguish the clear line between expenditure of taxpayer money for the public purpose with the illegal use of the state treasury for partisan political campaiging--even if Scott Jensen was unable to do so. This jury also recognized that Wisconsin's long tradition of clean, honest and accountable state government had been seriously undermined and compromised by Jensen.

In addition to jail time and fines that will be imposed on Scott Jensen as a result of his conviction, he must also be forced to reimburse the taxpayers for the approximately $70,000 to $100,000 of taxpayer funds he utilized in his defense leading up to his criminal charging in October of 2002. Common Cause in Wisconsin sued to stop the payment of these taxpayer funds to Jensen and others in December of 2001, and in the settlement of January 2003 brokered by Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager between CC/WI and the legislative leadership, anyone convicted in this scandal must reimburse the taxpayers of Wisconsin.

The guilty verdict in Scott Jensen's case today is not the end of this long, sorry episode in Wisconsin's political history however. The Wisconsin Legislature and the Governor must act soon and decisively to reform Wisconsin's throughly compromised and corrupted campaign finance and ethics laws before this state's once good name can be reclaimed and restored.