Pennsylvania’s highest court on Friday declined to intervene in the criminal case against the state’s top prosecutor, clearing the way for jury selection to begin next week.
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Kane, 50, of the Scranton area, is accused of leaking secret grand jury information to embarrass a political enemy and then lying before another grand jury in an attempt to cover up her alleged activities.
Steele called Kane’s latest appeal to the state’s highest court “a thinly-veiled, eleventh-hour attempt to stall the wheels of justice and avoid the public determination of her guilt”.
The state’s highest appellate court rejected this argument before Kane was even arrested last August as has Montgomery County Judge Wendy Demchick-Alloy, who will preside at Kane’s trial.
The attorneys contend the special prosecutor who presented the case to the grand jury overstepped his authority.
“Now is the time for trial”, Steele, First Assistant District Attorney Edward F. McCann Jr. and Deputy District Attorney Robert M. Falin blared in court papers filed on Wednesday.
A spokeswoman for the Montgomery County prosecutors who are handling the case declined comment on the court’s decision. They argue that means all charges against her must be dismissed. A month later, the state Supreme Court suspended her law license.
“The Commonwealth’s highest prosecuting officer has been accused of serious crimes”. Kane claims she was targeted for exposing a corrupt “good old boys” network where the same judges and prosecutors who were supposed to be battling the sexual abuse of women and children were allegedly passing around images on state government computers. Picking jurors is expected to take one to two days, and the trial is to begin afterward.
Montgomery County prosecutors argued in response to Kane’s motion this week that they had conducted their own investigation after receiving the grand jury recommendations.
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Kane, who is not seeking re-election, has claimed she did nothing wrong and has implied the charges are part of an effort to force her out of office because she discovered pornographic emails being exchanged between state employees on state email addresses. Messages left for three of Kane’s defense lawyers and for her at her offices were not returned. Amidst the scandal, state Supreme Court Justices Seamus McCaffery and Michael Eakin resigned.
