No Charges For Mark Foley

Disgraced former Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL) will not face charges for sending lewd emails and instant messages to congressional pages, according to sources that say an official announcement is about to be released.

Foley's attorney, David Roth, has acknowledged that Foley sent the messages to the teenagers, but has maintained that the Florida Republican never had inappropriate contact with minors. Roth had no immediate comment on the pending announcement.

State or federal charges were not able to be made because Foley apparently never met the teens in person, all of whom were over the age of consent.

Foley resigned in 2006 shortly after the scandal was made public by former Democratic staffer Lane Hudson, whom Foley had attempted to pick up in a DC bar eleven years earlier. Hudson was later fired from his job at the Human Rights Campaign for using his employers' computers to anonymously leak the story on his blog.