He Impersonated the Law and He Won

Mitt Romney’s week just got a little better. Granted, it’s only Tuesday, but our former governor won a small victory when his camp learned that Jay Garrity, Romney’s former aide who allegedly liked to impersonate cops, won’t face charges in New Hampshire.

Let’s remember what started the whole kerfuffle. New York Times reporter Mark Leibovich reported last year:

Between stops in New Hampshire, this reporter found himself trailing the former governor’s S.U.V. on a back road, only to be led to the shoulder and instructed to “veer off” by a man wearing an earpiece who emerged from Mr. Romney’s car. “We ran your license plate,” he told the reporter, and explained that no one was permitted to follow Mr. Romney’s vehicle.

Sounds pretty damning. So why won’t advance-man Garrity face charges?

[New Hampshire] Attorney General Kelly Ayotte said today that her office found no evidence that during the time in question, anyone had requested registration records for the car the reporter was most likely driving. She concluded no crime was committed. . . .

Ayotte wrote that based on the investigation and without further cooperation from Leibovich, “the investigation into Garrity reveals that no crime was committed with respect to Garrity’s encounter with Leibovich on May 29, 2007.”

The attorney general got involved after the head of a conservative political group, ConserveNH, sent her a copy of an Associated Press story about the incident and requested an investigation.

It is apparently difficult to prove a crime when the only evidence is a parenthetical aside in a New York Times article sent to you by a bunch of irate conservatives. We expect to see this plot on Law and Order once Fred Thompson drops out.

You got away with it in New Hampshire, Garrity. There’s still the matter of how Massachusetts treats you.