Benched: Impeaching West Virginia's Entire Supreme Court
Bribe, Swindle or Steal
Alexandra Addison-Wrage of TRACE International
4.9 • 582 Ratings
🗓️ 29 August 2018
⏱️ 22 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Lacie Pierson of the Charleston Gazette-Mail discusses the startling and controversial removal of all sitting justices in West Virginia.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome back to the Trace podcast, Brib, Swindle, or Steel. |
| 0:11.6 | I'm Alexandra Ragi. |
| 0:13.5 | A lot of attention is being paid to the role of national media on both the right and left right now. |
| 0:19.0 | But today's guest highlights for us the important role of |
| 0:21.3 | local journalists in holding the powerful accountable. After studying journalism at Marshall |
| 0:26.6 | University in her home state of West Virginia, Lacey Pearson went to work a few blocks |
| 0:31.2 | away at the Huntington Herald Dispatch. Currently a staff writer for the Charleston Gazette Mail, |
| 0:36.5 | she reports on the state judicial system, |
| 0:38.5 | including recent coverage of the impeachment proceedings brought against the state Supreme Court justices. |
| 0:43.5 | Lacey, thank you for joining me. |
| 0:45.0 | Thanks, Alexandra. I'm glad to be here. |
| 0:46.9 | A lot of our listeners are based outside the United States, but even within the U.S., the details of this story are, I think, not widely known. |
| 0:55.4 | The West Virginia Supreme Court is in a state of some chaos right now. When U.S., the details of this story are, I think, not widely known. The West Virginia Supreme Court is in a state of some chaos right now. When you and I first talked about this, you had written |
| 1:00.1 | about the indictment of one justice. So let's start there. Can you recount that story from late June? |
| 1:06.6 | On June 20th, which coincidentally is West Virginia Day in this state, the anniversary of the founding of West Virginia, U.S. District Attorney Mike Stewart announced that Al Laughre was the subject of a federal indictment. |
| 1:19.3 | Since June 20th, there actually has been two more indictments found against Laughey. |
| 1:23.4 | And at this point, he faces 25 counts in federal court, including wire fraud, mail fraud, |
| 1:29.4 | making false statements to federal investigators, witness tampering, and obstruction of justice. |
| 1:33.6 | So while a lot of those charges on their face don't have a necessarily financial element, |
| 1:38.1 | including like the witness tampering and lined investigators, |
| 1:41.3 | Lawfrey still is accused of misusing state resources, including state credit |
| 1:45.8 | cards and state vehicles, which on their face are not huge costs, but they are cost to taxpayers |
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