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Reuters
HARRISBURG
The mayor of Pennsylvania's third largest city, Allentown, is scheduled to appear at the start of his federal corruption trial on Monday, accused of soliciting campaign contributions in exchange for public contracts.
Mayor Edwin Pawlowski, who was re-elected to fourth term in November despite a sweeping"pay-to-play" indictment, is charged with 54 criminal counts, including bribery, conspiracy and fraud.
Pawlowski and Vaughn Spencer, a fellow Democrat who previously served as mayor of Reading, Pennsylvania, were charged in July in a long-running federal corruption investigation.
"Pawlowski and Spencer essentially put a 'for sale' sign on City Hall and sold out to the highest bidder," US Attorney Louis Lappen in Philadelphia said at a news conference when the indictment was unsealed. Pawlowski goes on trial at US Federal Court in Allentown on Monday with co-defendant Scott Allinson, a lawyer charged with bribery and conspiracy.
