New Jersey Judge Roy McGeady has approved a go-ahead in an investigation into whether or not Gov. Chris Christie engaged in misconduct during the George Washington Bridge lane closure scandal in 2013.
It was discovered that the governor’s political appointees had colluded to close certain lanes of the George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee so as to to create traffic jams and effectively punish the city’s mayor, Mark Sokolich, for having refused to endorse Christie.
The appointees were subsequently charged and are currently on trial, but Christie managed to evade any trouble until recently, when local activist Brill Brennan filed a citizen’s complaint against Christie citing official misconduct.
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“Christie knowingly refrained from ordering that his subordinates take all necessary action to reopen local access lanes to the George Washington Bridge from Fort Lee, New Jersey,” the complaint read, as reported by the New York Post.
Brennan also reportedly cited testimony from two officials, aide Bridget Anne Kelly and former Port Authority executive Bill Baroni, from the federal investigation into the bridge scandal, claiming they spoke with Christie before executing the lane closures.
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On Thursday, Judge McGeady reportedly approved the complaint.
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“I’m satisfied that there’s probable cause to believe that an event of official misconduct was caused by Gov. Christie,” he ruled, inadvertently eliciting applause from others present in the courtroom, according to NJ.com. “I’m going to issue the summons.”
Speaking with the Post, however, Christie’s spokesperson Brian Murray cautioned against taking the complaint too seriously, claiming that its approval was not analogous with the governor facing formal charges.
“This is a dishonorable complaint filed by a known serial complainant and political activist with a history of abusing the judicial system,” Murray stated. “The simple fact is the governor had no knowledge of the lane realignments either before they happened or while they were happening.”
“This matter has already been thoroughly investigated by three separate independent investigations,” he added. “The ruling is being appealed immediately.”
Murray was somewhat right about Brennan being a “serial complainant.”
In 2014, he unsuccessfully sued the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office in an attempt to unearth who at an auction had bidden on baseball memorabilia obtained from a drug arrest.
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