No doubt about it, your honor, I am guilty as charged.

Former Scranton Mayor Harry Davies bowed his head and closed his eyes as if in deep, powerful prayer.

U.S. District Court Judge James “Big Jimmy” Flynn scowled.

You understand I will take your recent cooperation with the FBI into consideration, the judge said.

Yes, sir, your honor, sir, I sure as hell hope so.

Big Jimmy the judge banged the gavel three times, each crack louder than the last, so hard he worried he sprained his wrist and injured his normally limber vodka-pouring hand.

Order in the goddamn court, Judge Flynn said.

With his chin touching his chest, Harry Davies stood slouched and unsettled, unconsciously picking lint off his blue sport coat as the judge spit words dripping with scorn.

You also understand your status as a former Scranton mayor, if you want to call getting elected mayor of Scranton status, makes no difference in the sentence I am about to hand down.

Sir, yes, sir, sir, Harry Davies said.

Harry was ready for anything but figured Flynn ought to give him the benefit of the doubt since Harry used to play cards with the judge’s loser brother back when Harry was a Democrat before he flip-flopped and registered Republican and then switched back to Democrat again to run in the primary.

Big Jimmy Flynn grinned.

Twenty years for public corruption with no possibility of parole, he said.

Former Scranton Mayor Harry Davies’ eyes rolled back in his head faster than the spinning cherries on a classic casino slot machine. His knees buckled as he dropped, slamming his chin off the edge of the defense table on the way down. Rising from the bench, Judge Flynn stared with disdain at the unconscious convicted felon and hissed a harsh goodbye

For the record, you puke, my sentence has nothing to do with your not hiring my wife’s brother in the zoning office, either, Judge Flynn said.

When Harry Davies came to, new Federal Bureau of Prisons inmate number 76927-067-15008-067 vowed to get even with the whole goddamn system that oppressed, tortured, disrespected and stuck him in a minimum security prison camp. Not wasting any time on his second day of incarceration, Davies wrote a letter to President Donald Trump requesting a full pardon.

What better way for Trump to get even with Joe Biden than to pardon the most crooked mayor in the history of Biden’s birthplace? Check that: the most crooked mayor ever caught and imprisoned in the history of Scranton. What better way for Trump to get even than to unleash a pathological former crooked Scranton mayor to run amok in Joe Biden’s childhood heaven?

Harry mailed the letter in care of his buddy Lackawanna County President Judge Stanley “Stash” Dombroski, a die-hard Republican and Trump confidant. Besides, with a full pardon Harry could run for mayor again.

He could run for Congress.

Maybe even president.

Harry Davies started to feel powerful again.

If Joe Biden can win, anybody can win. If the so-called crappy kid from Scranton can pull off a presidential victory, a bona fide scrappy kid from Scranton can do likewise. Besides, after all Harry did for Scranton, the feds had the gall to indict him, convict him, sentence him and lock him up for what amounts to a life sentence. With all the phonies, bagmen, pervert priests and two-bit grifters running around just in the downtown alone, the government grabs him?

If Judge Dombroski knew what was good for him he’d come through like a champ and immediately pull the necessary strings to persuade Trump to cough up a full pardon. That old crook Dombroski would know Mayor Harry Davies had in his possession stockpiles of incriminating evidence to support a variety of crimes countless city, county, state and even federal elected and appointed officials committed during the time they corrupted every notion of public decency, citizenship and civic duty.

Who could forget that night at the county/city prayer clam bake when Judge Dombroski drank 12 lime vodkas and Mountain Dews and let that floozy red-haired hairdresser Shannon Kelly spank him with wet halusky whips? Harry Davies got video of that in living color so vivid you can see the buttery yellow marks the thick, cholesterol-rich egg noodles made on the judge’s bare behind.

And that doesn’t even scratch the surface of documented bold bribes, years of brassy kickbacks and careers made on audacious quid pro quos, bad behavior that backslapping Democratic tribal elders and their flattering flunkies in the Electric City ignore as they sing the praises of Scranton values learned at the kitchen table.

President-elect Joe Biden swears he learned everything he needed to know about life at one of those Scranton kitchen tables.

Under the table is more like it.

In the meantime, former Mayor Harry Davies had an immediate plan.

A prison break sounded good. Escape became the first order of a new day. Harry felt like a new man already.

In Scranton everything depends on how you look at it.