THE governor of New York, Eliot Spitzer, could be impeached if he does not quit over a sex scandal.
The threat, by state Republicans, added to the pressure on Mr Spitzer, a Democrat, to step down after a report that he hired a high-priced prostitute.
The Wall Street Journal quoted a person close to Mr Spitzer, who is 48 and married, as saying he
would resign but he wanted to deal with his family crisis first.
"If he does not resign within the next 24 to 48 hours, we will prepare articles of impeachment to remove him," said James Tedisco, the Republican minority leader in the state assembly.
"We need a leader in place that has the support of people on both sides of the aisle."
It was revealed on Monday that Mr Spitzer, a former state chief prosecutor who made his name fighting white-collar crime on Wall Street, hired a $1,000-an-hour prostitute and was caught on a phone wiretap at least six times on 12 and 13 February, arranging to meet her at a Washington hotel.
Mr Spitzer, who also investigated prostitution as chief prosecutor, apologised for what he described as a "private matter" but said nothing about resigning. He spent Monday night holed up at his Manhattan home, besieged by media.
Crime chiefs said yesterday that the investigation began last year during an Internal Revenue Service review of suspicious financial transactions reported to it by banks. "The payments were made over a period of several months in a way that investigators believe was intended to conceal their purpose and source, which could amount to a crime called structuring (punishable by up to five years in prison]," one source said.
Mr Spitzer, viewed as a rising star in the Democratic Party, was elected governor with nearly 70 per cent of the vote in late 2006, following a stint as state attorney general.
At the heart of this scandal is a criminal complaint unveiled last week that charges four people with running a prostitution ring dubbed the Emperors Club. Prosecutors rarely bring charges against clients of prostitutes in such cases.
Mr Spitzer was identified only as "Client 9" in the court papers. According to these, Client 9 arranged to meet with "Kristen", a prostitute who charged $1,000 an hour, on 13 February.
"Client 9" wanted Kristen to go to Washington on a 5:39pm train from Manhattan on that date. The door to the hotel room would be left ajar. Train tickets, cab fare, room service, and the minibar were all on him.
"Yup, same as in the past. No question about it," the caller is said to have told Kristen's boss, when asked if he would make his payment to the same business as usual, a federal affidavit said.
The client paid $4,300 to Kristen, touted by the escort service as a "petite, pretty brunette", according to the court papers.
They went on say that an Emperors Club agent was told by the prostitute that her evening with Client 9 had gone well. The agent said she had been told that the client "would ask you to do things that … you might not think were safe … very basic things," according to the papers, but Kristen responded by saying: "I have a way of dealing with that … I'd be, like, listen dude, you really want the sex?"
Among the charges brought against the four defendants last week was transporting women across state lines for prostitution purposes.
It was not clear last night if a similar charge might be brought against Mr Spitzer if it were proven he arranged for Kristen to travel from New York to Washington to have sex with him.
NEW YORK MEDIA ROUNDS ON SPITZERELIOT Spitzer, then attorney general, had this advice in 2006 for people who break the law: Never talk when you can nod, and never nod when you can wink, and never write an e-mail because it's death. You're giving prosecutors all the evidence we need."
His own strident manner has backfired on him now. The New York Times said in an editorial yesterday that his insistence on Monday that it was a "private matter" displayed arrogance. "He did not just betray his family in a private matter," it said.
The Wall Street Journal said he had shown his lack of restraint in overly aggressive tactics as attorney general, making "extraordinary threats" to those who criticised his pursuit of high-profile Wall Street figures.
The New York Daily News, New York Post and Newsday all demanded he quit. "Hit the road, John…and make it quick!" said the Daily News, while the Post called him "NY's naked emperor".
The full article contains 795 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
