Jury at attorney general’s perjury trial reaches verdict

These are unbecoming of the commonwealth’s top law enforcement officer.

Gov. Tom Kane, a fellow Democrat, renewed his previous calls for Kane to step down.

The defense in Kathleen Kane’s criminal trial presented its closing arguments this morning, taking an hour and half, accusing prosecution witnesses Adrian King and Joshua Morrow of telling lies in connection with grand jury leaks that they say were carried out by Attorney General Kathleen Kane.

Kane showed “little emotion” when the verdict was announced Monday night, the Associated Press reported.

Kane, 50, was once a rising star in the state’s Democratic party, using her then-husband’s trucking fortune to run for statewide office after stints as a Scranton prosecutor and a stay-at-home mother. Kane’s lawyers did say they would appeal.

A jury found that Attorney General Kathleen Kane leaked confidential investigative material to a Philadelphia newspaper to get revenge on a political enemy and lied about it under oath, reports Katie Colaneri of member station WHYY. The judge also made it clear that if she retaliates against anyone, her bail would be revoked immediately and Kane would be incarcerated. However, she is not running for re-election this fall and leaves office in January.

Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin Steele noted, though, that Kane had chosen the men as confidants.

“The court is concerned, especially with respect to her potential to flee, particularly with her going to Haiti (in 2014) in the middle of her office’s tumult, and leaving no one watching the store”, Judge Wendy Demchick-Alloy told Kane’s lawyers.

Whatever the trial’s outcome, her 800-person agency has been in turmoil for the past two years, plagued by a revolving door of top managers; a special investigation of the leak that led up to the boss; and the deployment of Kane’s driver to snoop through office emails and keep tabs on who was cooperating. Former and current employees of the attorney general’s office testified they were shocked to discover the article included secret grand jury information.

Josh Morrow, a political consultant who helped run Kane’s campaign in 2012, testified last week the attorney general asked him to give the documents to a reporter.

The jurors agreed the first-term Democrat leaked information about a 2009 grand jury probe to embarrass a rival prosecutor.

Morrow, who testified with a grant of immunity, said he delivered the documents to Brennan, at the behest of Kane, and received them from King.

Kane did not testify or put on any defense witnesses.