Paterson Witness Tampering Charges Unlikely: Report

While Ticketgate is causing Governor Paterson some headaches, it looks like he may be able to put another scandal to rest.

The New York Daily News reports that investigators are coming up empty in terms of evidence that the governor is guilty of witness tampering.

Paterson is accused of phoning the victim in a domestic abuse case involving one of his top aides David Johnson and asking her to lay off.

But Sherr-una Booker, the victim and woman at center of the probe, has reportedly denied feeling threatened by Paterson during their phone conversation the day before she was due in court.

According to the News:

Sources also say conversations that several of the governor's aides had with Booker before the court date were too vague to nail down a witness tampering case. "It's a very difficult witness tampering case to make against Paterson," one source said. "But the investigation is not over."

In an interesting twist, Paterson's blindness, a much-mocked disability, may actually have benefited him in this case. Because he cannot use email, there is no paper trail of his communication and investigators must rely solely on eyewitnesses.

Perhaps Paterson was channeling his former boss Eliot Spitzer who once said, "Never put anything in an email."