Former Connecticut Gov. John G. Rowland has been convicted of his second felony and is looking at up to 57 years in prison – but at least he has a pension to look forward to.
Rowland in 2004 resigned from the governor’s office in the midst of a criminal investigation where he eventually pled guilty to conspiracy to commit mail fraud and tax fraud.
Now, he has been convicted of violating several federal campaign financing laws.
But he’ll keep receiving his $53,000 public pension. From the Missoulian:
A spokeswoman for Attorney General George Jepsen says he has no legal basis to revoke or reduce the 57-year-old Rowland’s pension because he’s a private citizen.
State law in 2008 targeted public officials convicted of a crime by preventing them from collecting a pension. Rowland, whose first conviction was in 2004, was unaffected by the new law because it was not applied retroactively. He resigned.
Rowland was convicted on Sept. 19 in federal court on charges he conspired to be paid for work on political campaigns while disguising the payments in business deals.
He’s due to be sentenced Jan. 7.
More on the most recent conviction, from the New York Times:
Six of the seven counts Mr. Rowland was found guilty of involved obstructing justice, conspiracy, falsifying documents relied on by federal regulators and other violations of campaign finance laws in connection with services he provided Lisa Wilson-Foley, a Republican candidate for Congress in 2012, and her husband, Brian Foley, an operator of nursing homes.
The Foleys pleaded guilty this year to related crimes and await sentencing. Mr. Foley served as the government’s star witness in Mr. Rowland’s trial.
Another of the seven counts, an obstruction charge, involved a contract Mr. Rowland drafted and presented to Mark Greenberg, a Republican congressional candidate in the 2010 election. That contract was never executed and Mr. Greenberg testified at Mr. Rowland’s trial that he ripped it up for lack of interest.
Rowland had already served 10 months in jail after he was convicted of fraud charges in 2004.
Photo credit: CT State Library c/o Photographer – Calabrese, Anthony via Wikimedia Commons