NY Times: Jury Hears Closing Arguments in Sheldon Silver Corruption Trial By Ben Weiser and Susanne Craig

A federal prosecutor( Andrew Goldstein, pictured)  told a jury on Monday that Sheldon Silver, the former speaker of the New York State Assembly and once one of the state’s most powerful politicians, had made millions of dollars through two corrupt schemes and should be convicted of all seven of the counts against him. 

What you heard during this trial is what Sheldon Silver secretly has been doing for years: Cheating, lying and getting away with it,” the prosecutor, Andrew D. Goldstein, said in a closing argument as Mr. Silver’s three-week corruption trial neared its conclusion in Federal District Court in Manhattan

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In the summation, which lasted for three hours and took up the court’s morning session, Mr. Goldstein methodically reviewed the government’s evidence that Mr. Silver had obtained nearly $4 million in illegal payments in exchange for taking official actions that benefited a cancer researcher, Dr. Robert N. Taub, at Columbia University, and two separate real estate developers, Glenwood Management and the Witkoff Group.

Mr. Goldstein said it was clear that Mr. Silver had set up the quid pro quo schemes and had been “motivated by the money.”

“It’s totally obvious,” he continued.

NYT story link:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/24/nyregion/jury-hears-closing-arguments-in-sheldon-silver-corruption-trial.html?_r=0