Word: palmed
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...Even after the previous prosecutions, McCarty's stings the most. The onetime intern to House majority leader Tip O'Neill was viewed as one of the most powerful politicians in Palm Beach County. She served as the county's Republican Party chair earlier this decade, and offered her office space in the county's governmental center to GOP attorneys during the Bush-Gore recount. She was a go-to fundraiser for nonprofits and political campaigns, and a mother hen to the affluent cities on the southeast coast...
...investment banks Raymond James and Bear Stearns. The couple also allegedly received at least $10,000 in hotel discounts at the Sunset Key Guest Cottages in Key West from owner Ocean Properties Ltd., which was chosen by the county commission (and Mary McCarty) to build a downtown West Palm Beach hotel next to its convention center. McCarty faces a maximum sentence of five years in prison, while her husband could get as much as three years...
...Only two years earlier, McCarty had described her bitter rival on the county commission, Tony Masilotti, as a "bad apple in the bunch" after he resigned shortly before pleading guilty to honest services fraud. Her sudden fall is symptomatic of a culture of graft that has plagued Palm Beach over the years. As the county's population mushroomed to 1.3 million people, so did the egos and perceived invincibility of the county commission, a board with the power to dole out millions of dollars in taxpayer grants to tight-budgeted cities whose mayors and commissioners regularly sought their endorsement. While...
...Many residents are shaking their heads at the continuing revelations, which come as Palm Beach County's real estate values have plummeted, foreclosures have soared, tourism has stagnated and nonprofits brace for the fallout from all the wealthy benefactors who were Madoff victims. Said former Boca Raton Mayor Steve Abrams, who has known McCarty for 20 years and is seeking to fill her vacancy: "Never a dull moment in Palm Beach County. It all seems to have come about ever since our infamous 2000 election. Maybe that cursed us or branded us as a notorious county...
...only certainty in the county is that more politicians in the area will be accused of bad behavior. "I wish I could say this is the last one, but I fear it isn't," Acosta said. The FBI set up a full-time corruption squad in West Palm Beach in 2007, and Acosta announced on Friday that the U.S. Attorney's Office recently bought an extra floor of space in the building it is housed in. The way things are going, they'll need...