Political Corruption

The list of corruption investigations in Israel in recent years reads like a Who's Who of the political elite. It includes every prime minister of the last 14 years, two previous presidents, two past Jerusalem mayors, numerous Cabinet ministers and one recently convicted felon who is still serving in the Knesset, or parliament. Ehud Olmert, the only former prime minister to be indicted, is accused of double-billing and is being investigated for allegedly accepting bribes in a real estate scandal.

Eight current and former Bell city leaders were arrested Tuesday on charges of misappropriating more than $5.5 million from the small, working-class community as prosecutors accused them of treating the city's coffers as their personal piggy bank. The charges follow months of nationwide outrage and renewed debate over public employee compensation since The Times reported in July that the city's leaders were among the nation's highest paid municipal officials. Among those charged was former City Manager Robert Rizzo, who led the way with an annual salary and benefits package of more than $1.5 million.

The arrests of most of Bell's elected leaders Tuesday brought cheers and dancing in the streets in the small, working-class city, but added to the already deep uncertainty about its future. With four of Bell's five City Council members facing corruption charges, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted to push for a court order to seize authority from them and turn day-to-day management over to an appointed receiver. Run for nearly two decades under the tight control of City Administrator Robert Rizzo, who was among those charged Tuesday, Bell now faces a possible recall election and an effort by state Atty.

Kenyans weary from decades of misrule have approved a new constitution designed to curb presidential powers and allow the removal of corrupt or incompetent politicians, according to final results released Thursday. After years of waiting for change, voters discarded the constitution in place since Kenya gained independence from Britain in 1963, a document blamed for many of the nation's ills, such as cronyism and tribal favoritism in politics and the bureaucracy. The new constitution curbs the sweeping powers of the president by devolving power to the regions and establishing a bicameral parliament.

They flooded Bell City Hall with requests for public records and packed a council meeting with an overflow crowd. They collected signatures demanding an audit of city officials' salaries and vowed to boot their handsomely paid politicians out of office. They even created a website and posted documents that the city refused to put on its official site. In the week since residents in this working-class suburb discovered that their city manager makes nearly $800,000 a year, Bell has experienced a sudden jolt of civic engagement.

President Obama flew to Afghanistan's capital Sunday evening and offered a tough message to President Hamid Karzai, urging that stronger action be taken to crack down on government corruption and to build respect for the rule of law. Later in his six-hour unannounced visit, his first to the war-battered country since becoming president, Obama received a rousing welcome from American troops at the sprawling Bagram air base outside Kabul. As midnight approached, camouflage-clad service members whooped and snapped pictures of the president, who dispensed hugs and handshakes before taking to the podium.

The story of Marina Salye has clung to Russia for years, a dark, cautionary tale that lurks beneath the rise of Vladimir Putin. A St. Petersburg legislator in the early post-Soviet days, Salye investigated Putin and boldly accused him of corruption. Then, soon after Putin ascended to the presidency, she dropped out of view. Putin was reelected, and she didn't say a word. Putin began to curtail local elections, rein in independent television stations and consolidate power, and she stayed silent.

When Mexico and the United States were entering a landmark free trade agreement 16 years ago, one thing was clear: Mexican farmers would initially find it difficult to compete with heavily subsidized U.S. agricultural products. The solution: Mexico created a special fund to dole out cash to the poorest and smallest farmers. Somewhere along the way, something went wrong. Today, the fund -- far from helping the neediest -- is providing large financial subsidies to the families of notorious drug traffickers and several senior government officials, including the agriculture minister.

Former San Bernardino County Supervisor Bill Postmus and the county's former assistant assessor were arrested Wednesday on suspicion of accepting bribes to push for a $102-million settlement between the county and a developer, state and county prosecutors said. It was the second time that Postmus and James Erwin had been arrested in connection with a political corruption probe in the county that has uncovered evidence of bribery, extortion, theft, forgery and use of the assessor's staff to do political work.

Roosevelt F. Dorn, who earned acclaim and criticism as a juvenile court judge and was an equally polarizing figure in more than a decade as Inglewood mayor, pleaded guilty Monday to a public corruption charge. The plea ends a political career that saw significant drops in crime, as well as Inglewood's attempt to bounce back from the loss of the Lakers and the Kings. But while supporters hailed Dorn's leadership, critics said he ran the city as a fiefdom. Dorn, who stepped down Sunday evening, is barred from holding public office for the rest of his life as part of his guilty plea to a misdemeanor conflict-of-interest charge.