The agreement to dismiss a felony computer-tampering charge against former Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens (R) included a secret provision in which the outgoing governor admitted that prosecutors had enough evidence for the case to go to a jury, the Kansas City Star reports.
Greitens agreed to resign as part of an agreement negotiated late last month with St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kimberly Gardner.
Scandal-plagued Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens (R) announced that he will resign from office after being subpoenaed to testify before an impeachment committee over allegations including sexual misconduct and misuse of charity donor lists for his political campaign.
His resignation will be effective on June 1 at 5 p.m.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch: “Word of the announcement came after damaging testimony by a former campaign aide and a ruling by a judge forcing Greitens’ team to reveal fundraising information.”
Embattled Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens (R) “has purchased at least $185,000 in television ads — set to begin airing this week — in a year when he is not on the ballot,” the Kansas City Star reports.
“Greitens’ campaign purchased the television air time as Missouri lawmakers are holding a special session to weigh whether to impeach the Republican governor.”
“Greitens has been hounded since January by allegations that he photographed a woman while she was bound and partly nude to keep her from speaking about an extramarital affair in 2015.”
Meanwhile, Democrats are running their own ads linking Grietens with U.S. Senate candidate Josh Hawley (R).
The woman with whom Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens (R) had an affair stood by her description of their encounters and apologized to the governor’s wife in a new interview with KSDK-TV.
Said the woman: “The second that he denied the things that were the most hurtful, that were the most hurtful for me to now have to relive. I just realized: now I have this decision. The only ethical thing I felt that I could do was to tell the truth.”
FBI agents have been questioning Missouri lawmakers about possible coercive tactics by associates of Gov. Eric Greitens (R), as the state legislature is set to consider impeaching the embattled governor, CNN reports.
Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens (R) “used an app that erases text messages to communicate with his taxpayer-funded staff, although he denies any suggestion that doing so violated Missouri’s open records laws,” the Kansas City Star reports.
“In a stunning development, St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner on Monday dropped her prosecution of Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens in the face of the defense team’s plan to call her to the stand,” the Kansas City Star reports.
Gardner said the move came after the judge agreed to a request by Greitens to call Gardner herself as a witness. She said the decision put her in an “impossible position” in which she would be “subject to cross-examination” by members of her own office.
Gardner’s office asked the court “to appoint a special prosecutor to refile the felony invasion-of-privacy charge against the governor.”
St. Louis Post-Dispatch: “After three months of an almost-daily barrage of courtroom fireworks, the public will hear for the first time next week from a woman who has accused Missouri’s sitting governor of physical and sexual abuse, of taking a semi-nude picture of her without her consent and threatening to distribute the photo if she told anyone about their encounter.”
“The indictment of Gov. Eric Greitens (R) on a felony invasion-of-privacy charge in February has triggered an investigation by a Missouri House committee as well as calls for Greitens’ resignation and impeachment. He also faces a second felony charge of computer tampering for allegedly taking without permission a donor list from a charity he founded.”
ABC News: “The woman, who has not been publicly identified, alleges that the married Greitens took an unauthorized photograph of her when she was partially nude, blindfolded and taped to an exercise machine during a sexual encounter in 2015. Prosecutors have said they do not possess the photo so the woman’s trial testimony is considered critical to their case.”
“Greitens has a host of problems besides the invasion-of-privacy criminal case. Shortly after that trial is to begin, the Missouri Legislature will initiate impeachment proceedings against the governor.”
Meanwhile, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that a forensic examiner was extracting data from Greitens’ cellphone in a locked courtroom.
“The Missouri General Assembly has taken the historic step of calling itself back into special session to decide whether to impeach Gov. Eric Greitens (R),” the Kansas City Star reports.
“According to the petition signed by 138 House members and 29 senators — both more than the three-fourths required in each chamber to call a special session — lawmakers will consider the findings and recommendations of a House committee investigating Greitens, ‘including, but not limited to disciplinary actions against Gov. Eric R. Greitens.'”
St. Louis Post-Dispatch: “The unprecedented move comes a day after the House released a second scathing report on the governor and sets the state for the special session to start during the governor’s trial on felony invasion of privacy charges related to an extramarital affair he had in 2015.”
Gov. Eric Greitens (R) “ran an off-the-books political campaign as early as 2014, took a charity donor list to raise campaign funds and ultimately lied about that list in a signed statement to the state’s ethics commission,” the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports.
“The findings are outlined in a 23-page report released Wednesday by a Missouri House committee investigating Greitens… The report contains evidence that Greitens and associates lied in campaign filings, a class A misdemeanor, and violated campaign finance law — a civil offense — when he operated a shadow campaign a year before filing required paperwork with election authorities.”
Kansas City Star: “It represents the latest in a growing set of accusations of criminal misconduct by Greitens, who is already facing two felony charges in St. Louis and calls for his impeachment in Jefferson City.”
A woman with whom Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens (R) acknowledged having a consensual affair told prosecutors that Greitens coaxed her into unwanted sexual activity as she was crying “like a wounded little animal on the ground, according to a legislative report that accuses the governor of mischaracterizing the woman’s testimony, the AP reports.
“The brief, graphic report from a special House investigatory committee is intended as a rebuttal to Greitens, who had asserted that the video interview of the woman ‘undermined the narrative’ of an earlier House report detailing the woman’s allegations that Greitens had been physically aggressive toward her.”
St. Louis Post Dispatch: “The report also included allegations the future chief executive, who ran on a family values platform, had spanked, slapped and shoved the woman during a series of sexual encounters that at times left her frightened and crying.”
“St. Louis prosecutors charged Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens (R) with a felony for his use of a charity donor list for his 2016 political campaign, adding to the first-term governor’s legal woes,” the AP reports.
“The charge of tampering with computer data is in addition to an earlier charge alleging Greitens took and transmitted a nonconsensual photo of a partially nude woman with whom he had an extramarital affair in 2015.”
St. Louis Post-Dispatch: “Now the House is considering a special session that may lead to Greitens’ impeachment. The new charge will give lawmakers more material to weigh as they decide how to proceed on that front.”
“Leaders in Missouri’s GOP-controlled House issued a stinging rebuke of Republican Gov. Eric Greitens on Tuesday evening, calling on the state’s chief executive to resign as scandals continue to consume his administration,” the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports.
Greitens responded on Twitter: “I will not be resigning the Governor’s office. In three weeks, this matter will go to a court of law—where it belongs and where the facts will prove my innocence. Until then, I will do what the people of Missouri sent me here to do: to serve them and work hard on their behalf.”
Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley (R) announce that his office has uncovered potential criminal wrongdoing by Gov. Eric Greitens (R) and he has turned that evidence over to the St. Louis prosecutor, the Kansas City Star reports.
Hawley said that during the course of an investigation into a charity founded by Greitens, his office “uncovered evidence of wrongdoing that goes beyond Missouri’s charity laws” and indicates “potentially criminal acts were committed by Gov. Eric Greitens.”
“During several sexual encounters with his hair stylist the year before he was elected Missouri’s governor, Eric Greitens (R) struck her in the face, touched her crotch without her consent and called her a ‘whore,’ the woman told a Missouri House committee,” the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports.
“The claims add disturbing new layers to the single criminal allegation Greitens faces — a felony invasion-of-privacy charge, for allegedly taking and transmitting a semi-nude photo of her without her consent.”
Kansas City Star: “The explosive allegations were among the findings of the bipartisan investigative committee of the Missouri House that has been looking into allegations of wrongdoing against the Republican governor.”
“The committee – five Republicans and two Democrats – concluded that the woman’s testimony is credible.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Wonk Wire, Political Job Hunt and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
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