Seizmore was never found "guilty" -- that only happens in criminal cases.

Jeff-

Funny post, but you need to make a couple of corrections. First, Sizemore was never "convicted" of anything. Second, and to that end, Sizemore was never "fined". The case against Sizemore was a civil case, not a criminal one.

The reason this is important is that by stating he was found "guilty" and "fined", you are reporting as fact that Sizemore was convicted of a crime, something that is simply not true (at least not yet).

Such a statement may expose yourself to a defamation lawsuit (although Sizemore would have to prove his reputation was damaged by this post, and that would be interesting in and of itself), because, as a matter of law, stating as a fact that someone has been convicted of a crime, when that is not true, is an act of libel.

Just wanted to give you a heads up. Consider this your Christmas gift.....

Okay, how's that look? I am obviously ignorant about legal issues.

Incidentally... I'm not sure that he shouldn't be upgraded from best local scandal to the "Outstanding Achievement in Corruption-based Chutzpah" award.

I suspect a certain Midwest governor's got that one locked up.

Because of the poor coverage of this case by the press, you're also ignorant of the facts. You write: "a jury found that he forged signatures on two anti-union ballot initiatives." Not so. Sizemore never forged any signatures. As part of the racketeering that his organizations were accused of participating in, the jury found that people within the organizations forged signatures. I suggest spending a little time with the search function at Preemptive Karma - it will help you avoid being sued for libel.

Sizemore did a number of things that were a lot more sophisticated than forging signatures on petitions, but you've probably never really been told much about them. For instance, he participated in a money laundering scheme that funneled large checks from Oregon donors through Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform and back to OTU to hide the source of the money from the public. He also failed to file tax returns he should have filed, falsified information on tax returns he did file, and spent an inordinate amount of 501(c)(3) charitable foundation money on political efforts, contrary to tax law. And then he spent a good deal of donor money on nice things for his family instead of the signature drives they thought they were paying for. He's got a real knack for getting money out of people and spending it on himself. Anyway, there's much more, but much to my surprise none of what he has done has seemed to get anyone sufficiently upset to throw him in jail for it.

What finally bought him a night in the can was lying to a judge. His insatiable greed was combined with arrogance - since he got away with it in 2001 by not being criminally prosecuted, he figured he might as well really go for it. So he abused the nonprofit foundation purposes even more, funneled money through even more organizations and into his own pocket, and blew off filing tax returns altogether. And then - horror of horrors - he lied about it to a judge. The lying was the straw that finally broke the camel's back.

Why are we still talking about this jackass and there are no articles about the corrupt Illinois governor or a question as to why there was a perception that Jesse Jackson Jr. could be bought? If D's don't hang their own folks first, we have no cred in calling for the heads of people like Sizemore.

Becky, I did actually dig around and it was sloppiness of writing (and ignorance of the way civil suits are decided) that led to my earlier sloppy language. However, I'm prepared to stand behind the language of "he" as opposed to "Sizemore's Oregon Taxpayers United" (language used in news reports) because he was held culpable. My intention is not to claim he's a terrible human being, but to point squarely at his actions, which appear from this distance to constitute corruption.

(Libel's hard to make, too. I am clearly offering this as opinion, not fact, to highlight his Golden Duke worthiness. I believe it would be difficult for Sizemore to make the argument that I'm damaging his reputation on that score.)

As for the post, it wasn't designed to be a re-hashing of Sizemore's notorious past, so I didn't detail all these things. Rather, it's to highlight what is happening now, as a continuation of his ongoing trouble with the law.

I don't see how you can say "a jury found that he forged signatures on two anti-union ballot initiatives." What bothers me most about that is he can so easily refute such a statement because he never forged anything and he never tolerated forgery. He even went to great lengths to prevent forgery. So by focusing on the forgery issue, you give him a golden opportunity to appear to be able to refute any cupability on his part at all in connection with the racketeering verdict, enabling him to continue to play the victim.