In the midst of an ennui affliction, this, from nearly a year ago, made me laugh:
A Missouri lawmaker facing federal fraud charges is learning what legislative exile is like.
Days after Rep. Tricia Derges was kicked out of the Republican caucus for allegedly falsely promoting a medical treatment that could treat COVID-19, House leaders assigned her new office space — in a windowless broom closet.
“Yes, I’m in a closet,” Derges told the Post-Dispatch Thursday.
The cubbyhole, listed as Room 400D, is located in a space near the House gallery, a sometimes crowded and loud corridor in pre-COVID times.
They also moved Derges’ seat on the House floor to be next to a fellow exiled Republican, Rep. Rick Roeber of Lee’s Summit, who was booted from the GOP caucus amid allegations that he abused his children. [St. Louis Post-Dispatch]
And is her situation improving? Not recently.
A federal judge has turned down a request to dismiss Medicaid fraud charges filed last year against a Republican state lawmaker from southwest Missouri.
In a decision issued Monday, U.S. District Court Judge Brian Wimes agreed with a December ruling by a federal magistrate that Rep. Patricia Derges’ request for a dismissal was “illogical and frivolous,” as well as “disjointed.”
Derges’ attorney, Albert Watkins of Clayton, had sought a dismissal alleging a witness in the case, U.S. Attorney Shannon Kempf, had directed a Medicaid fraud unit.
In recommending the court reject Watkins’ claim, U.S. Magistrate David Rush said Watkins’ motion was “unclear and unsupported, given the inclusion of irrelevant facts and hyperbole, as well as the lack of clarity and sufficient legal analysis.”
“Given the meandering factual allegations and arguments in her brief, it seems that defendant is attempting to weave an elaborate (and largely, unsubstantiated) narrative, implying that Mr. Kempf (and relatedly, the government) targeted defendant for some nefarious purpose, likely politically motivated, given the timing of her candidacy announcement, swearing-in ceremony as state representative, and the filing of the charges against her,” Rush wrote. [St. Louis Post-Dispatch]
The incompetent representing the fraudulent, apparently. I wonder how her spacious legislative quarters worked out. Did she have to cling to that, too?
