TRENTON - Convicted Mayor Tony Mack is in violation of state law and can no longer hold office, Judge Mary Jacobson ruled today.
Granting the request to remove Mack filed by the state Office of the Attorney General, Jacobson said Mack is no longer able hold office effective immediately.
"Once you are fond guilty by a jury of your peers not only does the presumption of innocence disappear but with it comes the stigma and the shadow ... of being found guilty by a jury of your peers of crimes of dishonesty,” Jacobson said. “ And it makes no sense to this court to interpret the forfeiture statue to allow a period of three or four months.”
Good Riddance to a Small City Class Troll.
The Trentonian weighs in:
Mack was expected to defend himself, which would have made for good theater, but in the eleventh hour his attorney for the federal corruption trial, Mark Davis, represented the mayor.
Davis argued that Mack should not be removed until sentencing, stating that is when the conviction occurs.
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The first-term mayor was allowed to stay in office since his conviction due to a loophole in state law and his refusal to resign.
From the
Trenton Times:
Replacing Mack in the office of the Mayor will be City Council President George Muschal, who will hold the post until council meets to vote that either he should stay in office until the June or appoint someone else to serve the remainder of Mack’s term. A municipal election is set for May when voters will elect a new mayor.
Mack was first elected to the post in 2010 and his time in office was filled with controversy. In July 2012, the FBI raided Mack’s home and City Hall in an investigation connected to a downtown parking garage project, which was in reality an FBI sting operation. Mack was arrested alongside his brother Ralphiel Mack and campaign supporter Joseph “JoJo” Giorgianni in September 2012 and the trio were charged with receiving bribes from the purported parking garage developer.