Fattah Status In Washington Up In The Air After Conviction

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Philadelphia Congressman Chaka Fattah was convicted on federal corruption charges emanating from his failed mayoral bid in 2007.

On Talk Radio 1210 WPHT, Chris Stigall spoke with Jeremy Roebuck from the Philadelphia Inquirer who said that is still unclear whether Fattah will resign from the House of Representatives.

"If that's something that he's considering at this point, he gave no indication of that. The only thing he was willing to say was he was going to confer with his lawyers and make some decisions in the next few days, but that was also in reference to his appealing the conviction."

He stated restrictions will be placed on what the 11-term Representative can do in his official capacity, but there are no rules in place to force him out until the appeals process has been completed.

"Under the House Ethics Committee rules you're now allowed to vote, you're not allowed to do any work for any of the committees he serves on, but I suppose there is potentially some value to still having him around in Washington, if you look at it that way, where he can perhaps influence other Congressman, get involved in some lobbying work even though he is not passing the votes on the floor."

Roebuck indicated it is still undetermined what role Fattah will play at the Democratic convention next month in Philadelphia.

"That will be something I'm interested to see, whether he shows up or not. He is a superdelegate to the convention. There's some expectation that he might be there but I don't know if there will be pressure from the party, maybe you stay away, or not. I don't know."

He also explained that, despite the conviction, sentencing for Fattah won't be finalized until later in the year.

"The sentencings are typically a ways out. It doesn't really have much to do with appeals but there are several motions that the defense can file after a conviction, trying to get the judge to, perhaps, reconsider the jury's verdict. Also, they do a pretty intensive investigation from the probation department that's presented to the judge as part of the sentencing recommendation before the judge will actually come back and impose the sentence. But, the heaviest charge here is that racketeering and conspiracy count, the RICO count, which is typically used to prosecute organized crime, mob figures, but it was a unique application in this political case, and that can carry up to 30 years."