Steve Benjamin's luck, good or bad?

Like precision timing, the Jonathan Pinson trial ended just before the biggest holiday of the summer. Columbia Mayor Steve Benjamin was able to issue the statement he  promised. We got the good word from him - he did nothing illegal - as all the happy people drove off “to where the pavement turns to sand.”
The big news in the city over which Benjamin sits, was the sacking of a popular newscaster, after Benjamin had cleared it all up.
Pinson, found guilty, on multiple counts, was not so lucky. 

And during Pinson's’s trial, the talk of parties and exotic dancers, a $50,000 pay-out, influence-peddling and ethics violations poured from the witness stand, into the streets, resting in printed headlines.

How much restraint and humility must it have taken for Benjamin, who knew he had done nothing wrong, to sit there and endure the battering-by-association being delivered upon him?
And who is the "Controlling Legal Authority" anyway?

On top of that, while we, the common, feast on the traditional grilled burger, topped with rumors of the powerful, with a seasonal watermelon desert, Benjamin is left in the stressful predicament of having to explain all the claims about him the people it affects personally. How fair is that?

But it is not a new position for the mayor. Bad luck has followed him before. Upon his election in 2010, there was that horrific vehicle accident in the early morning, scant hours after his election party.

And the failure of law enforcement to do their job, in processing the mishap, cast suspicion all over the high-ranking official.

In the end, there was nothing to it, as the mayor had assured us there wasn't. But still, the mayor had to face the whispers and the accusations of a cover-up.

And so we come to July 3, 2014. Again, the buzz is on the street. The character of Benjamin is in question. It seems lady luck has doled her fickle charms again upon the unfortunate son.

Did Benjamin do anything illegal or not? He said it is maybe just a bit of poor judgment, being around guilty people, at the wrong time. Benjamin said he has done nothing wrong. He said that in the car accident aftermath too, and he was backed up by the legal system.

So he has a track record of defeating the odds, when the evidence looked to be stacked against him. Who would bet against Benjamin this time?

And the bigger question is how can such happenstance befall such a good, hardworking and honest man?

Maybe the answer is luck.