This will be a slow, agonizing process. Bring a book. I'm bringing Bushwacked.
When Connecticut Gov. John G. Rowland made his emotional plea for forgiveness last week, he also drew a line in the sand when he insisted that he never - "not once" - took any action in exchange for gifts he accepted from state aides and contractors.
But legal experts say it is a line that he may find increasingly difficult to defend, as federal agents, ethics regulators and a legislative impeachment committee scour his record for any evidence of a link between his official actions and the gifts he has admitted receiving.
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Yesterday, the speaker of the State House of Representatives, Moira K. Lyons, said that the state's legislature, the General Assembly, will form a committee to consider whether to impeach the governor. The committee of House members, evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans, will have subpoena powers, Ms. Lyons said. She met earlier with Mr. Rowland.
All of Mr. Rowland's decisions are now being viewed through the prism of that admission, which not only threatens to skew Mr. Rowland's legacy as governor, but could put him in legal jeopardy as well. Having conceded one half of a potential quid pro quo, lawyers say, the governor has made himself vulnerable to those scrutinizing his every step during nine years as governor.
"An official act can be anything" - a phone call, a letter, a piece of legislation, a handshake on a deal - if it helps establish a quid pro quo, said Michael R. Sklaire, a former assistant United States attorney who helped prosecute Bridgeport Mayor Joseph P. Ganim last year.
"To make a criminal case," said Mr. Sklaire, "you've got to link the gifts to something the public official has done, and you do that through circumstantial evidence."
Typical of official actions that are sure to be looked at in a different light is 1998 legislation proposed by Mr. Rowland to suspend construction of new asphalt plants in Connecticut. The bill, written by the governor's staff and presented as a plan to improve air quality, passed easily in the legislature.
Among those who objected to the moratorium was State Senator Catherine W. Cook, R-Mystic, who warned that it would create a virtual monopoly for O&G Industries and Tilcon Connecticut, road-building companies that controlled 27 of the 37 asphalt plants in the state. Competitors also argued that it protected older, dirtier plants, while preventing cleaner ones from being built.
"We all had our suspicions that this thing was greased, because the legislation came out of nowhere and, in heartbeat, wiped everybody off the map except these two companies," said Franklin Pilicy, a lawyer for a Waterbury firm whose plans for an asphalt plant were upended by the moratorium.