Former state Supreme Court Justice Allen Loughry was set to be released from federal custody today, concluding a turbulent chapter in West Virginia political history.
Loughry’s sentence on federal fraud charges was coming to an end. For the past few months, he has been serving the remainder of his time through a federal halfway house program headquartered in Baltimore.
RRM Baltimore is a minimum security facility that provides assistance to inmates who are nearing release in the final 3 to 12 months of their sentences.
Through a third party, Loughry declined to comment for this story.
Loughry was sentenced to 24 months in federal prison on Feb. 13, 2019, and served the early part of the sentence as an inmate of FCI Williamsburg in South Carolina. The facility has a minimum security camp attached to the main medium security prison.
Two years ago, a jury found the former state Supreme Court justice guilty of 11 charges of mail and wire fraud, witness tampering and making a false statement to a federal investigator. U.S. District Judge John Copenhaver later acquitted Loughry on the witness tampering charge.
The mail fraud counts charged Loughry with improperly seeking travel expense reimbursement for travel to a conference, even though he had used a state vehicle and a state-issued gasoline purchasing card.
The similar wire fraud counts charged Loughry with using a state vehicle and state-issued gasoline purchasing card for personal travel. Most of those trips were for signing events for Loughry’s book on political corruption in West Virginia.
Although Loughry has concluded his sentence, he is pursuing a federal appeal based on whether the district court in Charleston erred by denying an evidentiary hearing to examine on a juror’s Twitter usage.
Loughry’s attorneys are asking for the lower court ruling to be reversed and for an evidentiary hearing to examine the matter further.
A three-judge panel with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit conducted an hour-long hearing about the matter in October.
Loughry was elected to the court as a Republican in 2012 for a term that began in January 2013. Loughry resigned November 12, 2018.
Loughry, the author of “Don’t Buy Another Vote, I Won’t Pay for Landslide: The Sordid and Continuing History of Political Corruption in West Virginia,” was chief justice of the Supreme Court when he fell under scrutiny for his use of public resources.
Public controversy enveloped Loughry as he faced allegation after allegation about the expensive remodeling of his office, his use of state vehicle for private travel and his moving an antique “Cass Gilbert” desk from the state Capitol to his home.
The scandals started with WCHS-TV reports about the office renovation. Loughry, in those television reports, initially blamed fired Supreme Court administrator Steve Canterbury.
Loughry went to federal investigators with his concerns, prompting them to dig into Supreme Court finances.
During Loughry’s trial, federal prosecutor Philip Wright told jurors during his opening statement that investigators initially set out to check Loughry’s claims, “but which swirled around and came back to him.”