Free Ray

It's time to let Ray Nagin out of jail.

A federal judge on Monday denied former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin’s appeal of his conviction and 10-year sentence for corruption charges.

U.S. District Judge Jane Triche Milazzo said that none of a litany of complaints Nagin raised about prosecutors and his own defense attorney, in a brief he wrote from a federal prison camp in Texas, justified overturning the first conviction of a New Orleans mayor for public corruption.

The 63-year-old Nagin is due to stay behind bars until May 25, 2023, according to a U.S. Bureau of Prisons inmate database.

Not saying he never should have been prosecuted.  Ray definitely did the petty crimes he's in jail for. But he was always more of patsy than anything else.  I'm sure from his point of view, he did everything right.  Pleased all the important people. Said all the right "let's run government like a business" things. Nagin just wanted to be another successful guy in the politics herd. 

That's why after Katrina, when it mattered the most, Ray did the "safe" thing and let the pro-gentrification crowd have whatever they wanted from him. That's his real crime but it's not the one he's in prison for.  And there are plenty of his erstwhile friends running free now who have done worse and fared better by it than he has.  Either way, the dude has suffered enough.