Keep eyes on the ball

SCRANTON (PA)
The Times-Tribune

May 29, 2018

Two events last week related to former state Attorney General Kathleen Kane’s tempestuous and truncated term of office offer a lesson for all public officials who have a difficult time separating governance from politics.

Friday, a three-judge panel of the state Superior Court unanimously upheld Kane’s Aug. 15, 2016, conviction in Montgomery County Court for perjury, false swearing, obstructing the administration of law, official oppression and criminal conspiracy. She was sentenced Oct. 24, 2016, to 10 to 23 months in prison, but has remained free pending appeal. And she still can petition the state Supreme Court to hear an appeal of the Superior Court decision.

Earlier in the week, state Attorney General Josh Shapiro announced that bishops of six Catholic dioceses, including Bishop Joseph Bambera of Scranton, had agreed not to contest the public release of an impending grand jury report on sexual abuse by clergy and the dioceses’ handling of those cases.

Kane, who had handled child sexual abuse cases as an assistant district attorney in Lackawanna County, launched that important investigation in 2016.

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