Just a cursory glance at this list of travel expenses will show that Chief Justice Samuel Goodwyn is being paid for commuting.
He was paid 35 times for a round trip of 213 miles at $.55 per mile or 107 miles one-way from Chesapeake to Richmond.
It is statistically impossible for all these “business trips” to be the same exact distance from his home in Chesapeake.
You can get an idea of what is going on when you see on his travel vouchers in his own words that the distance to Richmond is 107 miles from his residence.
All the rules of the Supreme Court, of Cardinal, which details the rules for all state agencies, and the IRS plainly state that when you travel from your home to work, you are commuting, and reimbursement for this travel is illegal.
It is a chance of 11,760 to one that a second claim of $117.60 can occur as a coincidence. Likewise, the chance for a second, innocent looking
$117.60 is 11,760 x 11, 760, or 138,297,600 to one. Long odds indeed.
Even if you park your car under the old apple tree in the same spot and then proceed to a reserved parking space, there are many possibilities that your mileage must vary, such as how many times you have to pee, or eat, as well as how much you had to swerve to avoid a chicken or drive around a garbage truck. So only by carefully parking in the same spot at the Supreme Court of Virginia can you rack up identical charges with such consistency.
Then you have to consider how many times does a Chief Justice go out on the road to various places to conduct business meetings with ordinary people. I have carefully calculated this and I come up with “zero.” A Chief Justice simply does not roam the countryside to discuss stgate business with ordinary run-of-the-mill state employees.
Actually, he sits in his luxury office, possibly with a flowi8ng black robe (and a curly white wig, as they do across the pond), and the people come to him. He does not seek out these people for “business meetings.”
Or, heaven forbid, does he just put down a figure that would appear to be business yet actually was for the forbidden fruit of commuting?