Northside Sun: Jim Hood allows "the judiciary to be a profit center" for campaign contributors

The Northside Sun blistered Attorney General Jim Hood today in an editorial criticizing the contracts from his office to campaign contributors and comparing his "pay to play" reputation with that of his former campaign contributor and former outside counsel and special attorney general Joey Langston.

Maybe it’s just a coincidence that some of Attorney General Jim Hood’s largest campaign supporters also happen to get a big slice of the state’s litigation business he farms out to private attorneys.

The system needs to change either to bring more competition to how these contracts are awarded, or to prohibit the attorney general from receiving campaign donations from those who do business with his office.

Some of these same people pitching lawsuits to Hood also happen to show up prominently on his list of campaign contributors. For instance, Texas attorney Ken Bailey gave $75,000 to Hood’s re-election campaign in 2007 and another $110,000 over the past three years to the Democratic Attorney Generals Association, another major Hood donor.

What interest does a Texas attorney have in a Mississippi attorney general’s election, other than the hope that the investment will pay off for him? In Bailey’s case, it has and then some. He is scheduled to receive $2.78 million in attorney’s fees paid by Eli Lilly on top of the $18.5 million the drugmaker has agreed to pay the state in a recent settlement over antipsychotic drugs.

According to the U.S. Chamber Institute for Legal Reform, Bailey is just one of several attorneys with a financial stake in Hood’s office. It claims Hood, in his first five years in office, received more than $500,000 from attorneys and law firms doing business with the attorney general.

Just a quick insertion here. That number may be true, but the Wall Street Journal puts the number at $790,000 "from partners and law firms that have benefited financially from [Hood's] office" just in 2007 alone.

Let’s not forget that two of Hood’s biggest campaign contributors, Dickie Scruggs and Joey Langston, are now in prison for attempting to bribe a judge.

Scruggs and Langston were well-known for perfecting this ploy of spinning campaign contributions into big legal fees. You would think that Hood would rush to be squeaky clean after witnessing the fate of his cronies. Instead, the shady practices continue. Hood keeps thumbing the nose at the electorate. Not a politically wise course given an electorate demonstrably averse to politicians lining their pockets in exchange for favoritism.

When Langston was sentenced, the judge stated, “The damage you have done to the rule of law is the real tragedy in this case.” Allowing the judiciary to be a profit center for well-connected campaign contributors is just one more chapter in this sordid story.