Spin Cycle

Unlike the lap-up-every-leak approach of parts of the NY press, the WSJournal continues its admirable efforts to point out the uncertainties in some of the loose talk about financial crimes. From today's paper:

"Mr. Spitzer may be vulnerable to charges that he sought to evade federal banking laws in extracting cash from his bank accounts to pay the Emperors Club, but the evidence for such a crime is far from clear-cut. Mr. Spitzer may have made some effort to avoid federal scrutiny of three wire transfers totaling about $15,000 by dividing his withdrawals into pieces, people familiar with the matter said. Still, the transactions were ultimately executed under his name and in accordance with other regulations.

"In addition, a prosecution for violating the banking regulations would require proving his intent was to break the law rather than just avoid embarrassment, one former prosecutor said."

The paper also points out, as others have, that while Spitzer seemed to have clearly violated the Mann Act, clients are almost never prosecuted under that statute. Which is why you wonder exactly who became obsessed with using wiretaps and FBI agents to try to prove that he was seeing a prostitute.

If the evidence of criminality involving money movements turns out to be ambiguous or weak, the conclusion will become fairly inescapable that someone in federal law enforcement decided that it was their job to pursue the non-statutory offense of criminal hypocrisy.... and then behave like a hypocrite by leaking.