If it isn’t the most corrupt state in the United States, it’ s certainly one hell of a competitor. Even the most cynical agents in our office were shocked.
— FBI special agent Robert Grant, quoted by the Chicago Tribune, characterizing Illinois’ place “in the pantheon of political corruption.”
Connect:
I just knew Illinois wasn’t the most corrupt state so I did some research and viola’, it’s not, not by a long shot. I suspected that my home state of Louisiana was but, no, it’s not either. Taking into account the number of people who live in a state and how many indictments and convictions took place for public coruption, North Dakota is the most corrupt. Louisiana is much worse even than Illinois. Maybe it’s all the Al Capone/Untouchables drama that has people saying IL is so corrupt but the facts just don’t bear that out.
That IS interesting, Garry. I would have picked Louisiana also. But we’re just talking about government corruption. For people defrauding one another, it’s Utah, at least according to Jon Krakauer in Under the Banner of Heaven. Those Mormons have followed well in the footsteps of their founder, Joseph Smith, who was run out of town after town for lying, cheating, swindling, or stealing from somebody.