Expect crocodile tears from crooked Kenny

She didn’t give a damn about the people she implicated on a variety of federal corruption charges. Not former commission colleagues Dario Herrera, Mary Kincaid-Chauncey and Lance Malone, now incarcerated for redefining “pay to play” politics. Not real estate consultant Don Davidson, currently on trial over allegations that he helped bribe Kenny and establish an offshore bank account for her tainted fortune. And not Michael Galardi, the imprisoned former strip club magnate whose bribes funded her lavish lifestyle and poisoned the most powerful elected body in Southern Nevada.

No, it’s always been all about Erin. As her former constituents can attest, if you can’t do something for her — or lack the power to do something to her — you’re more likely to get verbal abuse than the time of day.

That’s why the public is certain to see a much different Kenny on Wednesday at 9 a.m., when she’s scheduled to appear before U.S. District Judge Kent Dawson for her own sentencing.

Four years ago, Kenny pleaded guilty to wire fraud, bribery and conspiracy and agreed to cooperate with federal prosecutors in exchange for a reduced sentence. Although Kenny was by far the greediest politician ensnared by FBI wiretaps, the terms of her plea agreement stipulate that she serve no more than five years in prison and forfeit $70,000.

Such penalties are disgracefully inadequate for someone who was more than willing to destroy the quality of life in any southwest valley neighborhood if doing so meant she could live in a bigger house. Kenny sold herself and the power of her office so enthusiastically — “I’m on my knees begging” she once exclaimed on a recorded telephone conversation — she made the hookers off Fremont Street seem downright discriminating.

And yet Kenny will ask Judge Dawson for leniency. She told a jury last year that she doesn’t think she should serve a day in prison because she has lived in a “public jail.”

No doubt the manipulative Kenny has been preparing for this hearing for years. She’ll admit her sins, lament her excesses and express regret for how her disgusting behavior has affected the lives of her children. She’ll probably turn on the tears. And she might even apologize to all the voters of Clark County for violating their trust.

If Judge Dawson buys any of this act and gives Kenny even a single day less than the maximum five-year prison sentence, it will be a miscarriage of justice.

In the 4 1/2 years since Kenny vacated her office, she has been allowed to keep most of her bribe money — tax free. She has been paid nearly $1 million by homebuilder Jim Rhodes to serve as his local government “consultant,” even though her name is a scarlet letter at the Clark County Government Center. And she and her husband bought a million-dollar home in an exclusive, gated Summerlin neighborhood.

She has demonstrated that crime does indeed pay, and she’s sorry only that she was caught.

Because the federal government has shielded Kenny from public scorn for four years — allowing her to enter a guilty plea in a secret hearing, whisking her in and out of the federal courthouse for testimony — Judge Dawson owes taxpayers an open repudiation of the most dishonorable elected official in modern Las Vegas history.

It’s incumbent upon him to deliver the shame she so richly deserves but has thus far avoided. He must get to the bottom of her sullied finances and whether she’ll make any meaningful sacrifices as a result of her sentence. He must make a declaration of whether justice was served by allowing this crook to cop a plea in exchange for testimony of dubious value.

Judge Dawson needs to give the despicable Erin Kenny something to really cry about.