WASHINGTON (AP) 鈥� overturned the bribery conviction of a former Indiana mayor on Wednesday in an opinion that narrows the scope of public corruption law.
The high court's 6-3 opinion along ideological lines , who was convicted of taking $13,000 from a trucking company after prosecutors said he steered about $1 million worth of city contracts the company's way.
The decision continues a pattern in recent years of the court restricting the government鈥檚 ability to use broad federal laws to prosecute public corruption cases. The justices also overturned the bribery conviction of in 2016, and the court sharply curbed prosecutors鈥� use of an anti-fraud law in the case of in 2010.
Snyder, a Republican, has maintained his innocence, saying the money was payment for consulting work. His attorneys argued before the high court that prosecutors hadn鈥檛 proved there was a 鈥渜uid pro quo鈥� exchange agreement before the contracts were awarded and that prosecuting officials for gratuities given after the fact unfairly criminalizes normal gift giving.
The Justice Department countered that the law was clearly meant to cover gifts 鈥渃orruptly鈥� given to public officials as rewards for favored treatment.
But Justice Brett Kavanaugh, writing for the conservative majority, said 鈥渢he government's interpretation of the statue would create traps for unwary state and local officials."
A gratuity or reward could be unethical or illegal under other laws, but it doesn't violate the law Snyder was charged with breaking, he said.
In a sharply worded dissent joined by her liberal colleagues, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said that that reading ignores the plain text of the law. She said Snyder's argument was an 鈥渁bsurd鈥� reading of the law that 鈥渙nly today's court could love.鈥�
Snyder was elected mayor of the small Indiana city of Portage, located near Lake Michigan, in 2011 and was reelected four years later. He was indicted and removed from office when he was first convicted in 2019.
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Lindsay Whitehurst, The Associated Press
