Image via the Massachusetts Office of Campaign and Political Finance

— Quincy Massachusetts News by Quincy Quarry News – News, Opinion and Commentary.

(“Ruh roo …”)
A Quincy Quarry News exclusive file photo

The Massachusetts Office of Campaign and Political Finance (“OCPF”) has yet again slapped Quincy Mayor Thomas P. Koch with fines over his campaign fund accepting various sorts of illegal campaign fund donations.

While OCPF imposing sanctions on Quincy Mayor Koch is nothing new as he would clearly appear to be the most often sanctioned Massachusetts politician over the accepting of so-called “straw donations” — including one instance that was the then and and likely still is the second largest set of fines ever imposed by OCPF on record, the OCPF sanction letter over the latest bucket of campaign fiance law violations poses new levels of at least raised eyebrows.

“I promise to never do this again …”
An old Columbia Pictures still image

For starters, The Koch Committee was not only ordered to disgorge the illegal campaign fund “donations,”: it was also hit with a rare fine.

Unclear, however, was the $15,000 fine imposed because the Koch Committee has been so frequently sanctioned by OCPF or over the apparently new sorts of violations of applicable law.

Further, OCPF made no mention of the source(s) of the illegal campaign fund donations, something which is standard operating procedure for OCPF when it sanctions offenders.

In turn, Quincy Quarry’s legal and other affairs desk could only reasonably suggest that no mention of the source(s) of the illegal funds clearly suggested that OCPF has referred at least some of its findings along to an agency or perhaps agencies with criminal investigation and/or prosecutorial authority.

In other words: 

Grilling someone over steak tips?
An Omlawcomua image

Unclear, however, is if and then who might have dropped a dime on the financial misdeeds.

Even so, it is only reasonable to include the name of the said to be best man at the mayor’s wedding and who is now facing sentencing in federal court given his anticipated pleading out on variously embezzling over a $100,000 in city funds including purloining short money payments made by seniors typically but getting by on limited incomes.

After all, merely the fear of prison showers has been known to give rise to playing let’s make a deal.

At the same time, the OCPF announcement does pose a viable answer to an ongoing question that has lingered for months on the Quarry’s financial and other affairs desk: why in recent months has the Koch Committee paid out over $23,000 to date to a Boston-based law firm with local ties that is known as the go-to law fire for politicians facing ethical sorts of problems.

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