Suspicions grow as Baltimore mayor's leave drags on.
Viewers of Baltimore newscasts are getting used to seeing images of embattled Mayor Catherine Pugh's lawyer pulling up to her three-story house and vanishing inside. He later insists that her health is too fragile for her to think clearly enough to make decisions about the future.
While the first-term Democratic mayor still has some supporters with a wait-and-see attitude, numerous citizens who had been willing to give Pugh the benefit of the doubt now perceive her indefinite leave with suspicion. It's something her main attorney, Steven Silverman, is acutely aware of as calls for her resignation accumulate.
Some lawmakers are losing patience with her silence as her indefinite home leave drags on. State Sen. Jill Carter, a Baltimore Democrat who sponsored an initial reform bill that exposed alleged"self-dealing" by Pugh and other members of a Maryland medical system's board, says Silverman should produce some kind of documentation from the mayor's physician.
The scope of their investigation is not yet clear, but federal criminal investigators have vigorously joined state and city probes of murky arrangements that somehow earned Pugh roughly $800,000 over years selling her obscure self-published children's books in bulk to customers including a hospital network she once helped oversee as a state senator and major health carriers with business before the city.
Whether or not Pugh has lost her grip is anyone's guess, but she seems unable to do much at this point to salvage her political career. With her alliances in tatters, political analysts say Pugh's biggest bargaining chip with criminal investigators appears to be her refusal to resign. Only a conviction can force her ouster.
During her lengthy political career, Pugh has long had a reputation as a hard worker, logging long days at the office. She frequently started her day as mayor with a pre-dawn jog and always cut a fit figure, even as she approaches 70 years of age. She's said she generally sleeps just a few hours a night.
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