Eleven current and former New Jersey state legislators who served with John Lynch are among the 172 people who are asking a federal judge to give the former Senate President a lenient sentence during a hearing next week, according to a Star-Ledger report. Lynch, who was among the state’s most powerful politicians for two decades, faces up to 41 months in prison after pleading guilty to corruption charges. Lynch’s backers are: Robert Smith, a Middlesex County Democrat who moved up to the Senate when Lynch retired in 2001; Middlesex County Democratic Assemblymen Peter Barnes and Joseph Egan, a longtime Lynch ally who has spent 25 years as a New Brunswick City Councilman; former Democratic State Senators John Russo (who preceeded Lynch as the Senate President), William Hamilton, Thomas Paterniti, and Gerald Stockman; former Republican State Senators Raymond Bateman (who served in the Senate with Lynch’s father), John Dorsey, Jack Sinagra and John Gallagher.
