Sheldon Silver, former Democratic speaker of the New York State Assembly, was convicted Friday on charges of corruption for a second time. In 2015, Silver was convicted of honest services fraud, extortion and money laundering, having allegedly received almost $4 million dollars in exchange for taking official actions that benefited […]
Tag: Silver
Court overturns Silver’s corruption conviction, U.S. attorney says he will re-try case
A federal appeals court has overturned former New York Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver’s corruption conviction because of incorrect jury instructions. The United States Court Of Appeals For The Second Circuit in Manhattan concluded that “erroneous” jury instructions were given by the judge in Silver’s 2015 trial. The court cited a […]
Spending on lobbying is down in most recent session
The amount of money spent on lobbying state lawmakers dropped nearly 10 percent between the 2015 and 2016 legislative sessions, according to the state ethics officials. In the session immediately following the convictions of Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, clients of lobbyists spent $120.2 […]
Addressing corruption is voters’ top end-of-session priority
Voters overwhelmingly support stripping pensions from legislators and state employees convicted of crimes related to their public jobs; Divided on limiting legislators’ outside income to 15 percent of salary; Strongly pessimistic that anti-corruption legislation passes by June Ninety-seven percent of New Yorkers say it is important for the governor […]