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<p>In pursuit of a crack cocaine high, Louis Elmy sank to horrid lows, damaging far more than his family name.</p><p>The ex-president of the Wilkes-Barre Area School Board and former city council hopeful pleaded guilty last week to charges including extortion. Prosecutors say that Elmy, fueled by a drug problem, abused his authority as a work-release counselor at the Luzerne County prison, providing favors to inmates in exchange for cash, alcohol and their assistance in connecting him with drug dealers.</p><p>When he ran low on money, Elmy even traded his guns to drug suppliers in exchange for the illicit substance that he craved, prosecutors said. The city resident allegedly went so far as to saw off the barrels of shotguns to make the weapons more appealing to would-be buyers.</p><p>Elmy&#8217;s case serves as yet another demoralizing setback for a public hoping that Luzerne County can turn a corner on public corruption and crime.</p><p>Since 2009, area residents have witnessed a string of &#8220;model citizens&#8221; &#8211; from county judges and commissioners, to school board members and businessmen &#8211; exposed as money-grubbing, law-flaunting frauds. Each episode further erodes people&#8217;s confidence in our shared institutions, including our courts and schools.</p><p>Meaningful reform efforts have led to changes, for instance, in the way that the county&#8217;s juvenile justice system operates. However, people of Elmy&#8217;s ilk undercut the progress.</p><p>The alumnus of GAR High School and King&#8217;s College lived a two-faced existence.</p><p>While seeking election to a city council seat last year, Elmy campaigned on the premise that he wanted to &#8220;combat the out-of-control drug trade.&#8221; Unbeknownst to most everyone, however, he was financially supporting that trade. He began buying crack cocaine sometime around 2013, prosecutors say. They further allege he falsified court orders as another way of wielding power over inmates.</p><p>Elmy&#8217;s public conduct, while not hinting at criminality, had for many years raised red flags about his ethics. In October 2013, a Times Leader editorial called for him to resign his post overseeing the school district, where his wife worked, because of his apparent disregard for putting a fast stop to nepotism and the conflicts of interest that invariably arise when relatives of elected school officials work in the same district. In 2015, he was accused of campaign finance fraud.</p><p>Elmy, 51, awaits sentencing on one charge of extortion and one charge of possession of a firearm in furtherance of drug trafficking. The latter charge carries a mandatory minimum of five years in prison.</p><p>The impact of his misdeeds will be felt hardest by Elmy and his loved ones. But make no mistake. When local elected officials and authority figures engage in crime, the harm cuts deep into the community.</p><p>And that&#8217;s why the offenders should be sternly punished.</p><style>
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Our Opinion: Former prison worker Louis Elmy’s criminal acts demoralizing to community