What's in the water in Detroit?

Seriously, what's up in that third-world city these days? Recently three Democrats who were indicted for bribery and corruption-related offenses separately pled guilty (and got pretty light sentences, IMHO) and as soon as they were sentenced, they filed appeals seeing to rescind their guilty pleas.

First we have Monica Conyers, wife of Congressman John Conyers. She was accused of peddling both her own influence as Chair of the Detroit City Council and taking money to deliver his vote on at least one issue. She pled guilty to a single count and got 37 months in prison. (I note for the record that he wasn't investigated, nor did he show any real support for her during or after her trial.) The loudmouth known even among Democrats as "Monica Monkey" due to her antics and public conduct is now claiming that she only pled guilty to bribery because she was unable to resist pressure from her lawyer, the government and the news media, apparently forgetting that she is herself a lawyer, something that she used to brag about when on the city council.

Monica's former Chief of Staff, Sam Riddle, also pled guilty to similar bribery charges and now he too is trying to appeal and get his thirty-seven month sentence lifted, even though he's also doing two years consecutively for pointing a shotgun at his then-shack-up, former Democratic State Representative Mary Waters.

Waters, by the way, is the third side of this warped triangle. She also pled guilty to accepting a bribe (and not reporting the income) and got a sentence of probation. But not to be outdone by her lover/attacker and his former boss, she's appealing her plea agreement, too. (Apparently she feels that it might hurt her in her current race for a State Senate seat.)

Naturally the prosecutors are contesting these attempts to take back the guilty pleas, and it's doubtful that the judges will allow the pleas which were knowingly and freely entered into to be withdrawn just because the convicted parties now suspect that they could beat the raps or just want better offers. Still, you hardly have to wonder why very few people are willing to take a politician's word on anything when we are treated to the spectacle of not one but three of them all admitting that they committed crimes and then trying to go back on their word. I mean, if you can't trust a politician to be truthful about his or her criminal activity under oath in open court in cases where the US Attorneys have them dead to rights (otherwise they wouldn't have pled out), when exactly can you take one at their word?