He was one of the most powerful men in the state of West Virginia. As the Chief Justice of the West Virginia Supreme Court, Allen Loughry , could bring a lot of power to bear, but now, he will be spending the next two years in the Big House for massive corruption.
Loughry will serve two years for his conviction for wire fraud, mail fraud and lying to federal investigators. He wasn’t alone. The entire Democratic court was either convicted or impeached, driving them from office and allowing the Republican governor to select their replacements. They never saw that coming.
Former West Virginia Supreme Court Chief Justice Allen Loughry surrendered at a federal prison facility in South Carolina Friday, where he will serve a two-year sentence for crimes relating to a sweeping public corruption scandal.
In addition to criminal penalties, Loughry was disbarred from legal practice, agreed never to seek public office again and paid fines totaling $12,000.
Local press accounts of lavish renovations at the state Supreme Court set off an audit of the justice’s spending practices. That inquiry discovered that Loughry and another justice, Menis Ketchum, used state resources for personal purposes. A federal investigation followed, leading to a battery of criminal charges against Loughry and Ketchum.
Among other offenses, investigators discovered that Loughry collected compensation from a law school for travel expenses he had not incurred and removed a state-owned antique desk from a public facility to his private residence. The famed architect Cass Gilbert designed the desk, the estimated value of which is $40,000.
Loughry is the author of a lengthy history of political corruption in West Virginia called “Don’t Buy Another Vote, I Won’t Pay For A Landslide.”