Around House Democratic Whip Mike Veon’s office, they had a nickname for Jeff Foreman — ‘‘The Grim Reaper.’‘

During campaign season, Foreman would work his way through his boss’ offices on the Capitol’s fourth floor, court documents show. Stopping at each desk, he’d ask each employee if they wouldn’t mind ‘‘volunteering’‘ to help elect Democrats.

Then Veon’s chief of staff, Foreman rarely took no for an answer, the documents show, and he once reduced a reluctant employee to tears because she knew she’d have to miss trick-or-treating with her young son to comply with his request.  read more »

As part of an ongoing public corruption investigation, agents from the Attorney General’s Office today filed numerous theft charges, as well as criminal conspiracy and conflict of interest charges, against 12 suspects, including a state representative from Beaver County, a former House Democratic Minority Whip and four current House Democratic staffers. The investigation has uncovered the illegal use of millions of dollars in taxpayers’ funds, resources and state employees for political campaign purposes.  read more »

As then-House Minority Whip Mike Veon fought for his political life in 2006, the lines between campaign and state work blurred to the point they were sometimes indistinguishable, with phone canvassers using lists of constituents who had visited his state office and with state workers assembling phone scripts and voter registration strategies.

More than 80 e-mails obtained by the Post-Gazette show how the Veon campaign drew dozens of state workers from Harrisburg and beyond to Beaver Falls in spring and fall of 2006 to work for his reelection. Most of those were later among the roughly 700 state employees who received large, taxpayer-funded bonus payments, ostensibly for outstanding state work, even while some of them spent little time at their state jobs that year.  read more »