The Scandal That Could Ruin Josh Shapiro's Chances in the Veepstakes

At the moment, it looks like Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro is favored to be selected as Kamala Harris's running mate.

Shapiro has been the target of some damaging leaks in the past week, including the fact that he allegedly covered up sexual harassment in his office. There is also a lot of pushback coming from progressives in the party who don't like his position on school vouchers or his stance on the Israel-Hamas war. So far, none of these issues seem to be hurting his chances. According to reports, Harris will appear at a rally with her running mate on Tuesday in Philadelphia, Pa., and Shapiro has canceled some of his weekend fundraisers. These two developments have increased the chances that he's the guy. From Harris's perspective, Shapiro would make winning Pennsylvania much more likely.

But if he's chosen, a 2011 case from Shapiro's time as Pennsylvania Attorney General could become a significant threat to the possible Harris-Shapiro campaign.

In 2011, 27-year-old Ellen Greenberg, a first-grade teacher at Juniata Park Academy, died in an apartment she shared with her fiancé, Sam Goldberg in Manayunk. Her body was found with a knife in her chest on the floor of the kitchen and the Philadelphia Assistant Medical Examiner Marlon Osbourne found 20 stab and slash wounds, half of which were in the back of her neck and head.

"Philadelphia Medical Examiner Marlon Osbourne initially ruled her death a homicide," NPR reports, "noting the large number of stab wounds, including 10 to the back of her neck. After police publicly challenged the findings, Osbourne switched the ruling to suicide without explanation."

The death was ruled a suicide and then-AG Josh Shapiro backed that up when the case landed on his desk, despite the clamor that it was a homicide. The Greenberg family has been fighting to have her death ruled back to a homicide for all these years, and there is evidence that many say backs up their claim.

Greenberg's parents have been battling the city of Philadelphia to reclassify Ellen's death as a homicide. In 2021, former Assistant Medical Examiner Dr. Lindsey Emery testified that in 2019, she reviewed Ellen's spinal column and found that at least two stab wounds were inflicted after death. Despite this, then-Pennsylvania Attorney General Shapiro upheld the suicide ruling.

But this case is more than a decade old. Why is it going to be a problem now? Well, CBS News reported earlier this week that "The Pennsylvania Supreme Court will hear arguments from the family of Ellen Greenberg, a Philadelphia educator who died in 2011 in a case her family argues was not a suicide as officially ruled."

Greenberg's parents have fought for years to undo the official paperwork ruling Ellen's death a suicide. Lawyers for her parents have alleged the investigation was mishandled.

"We don't believe our daughter committed suicide," Ellen's father, Joshua Greenberg told Joe Holden last year.

Now a lengthy court battle will continue to the next round - Pennsylvania's highest court.

"The Pennsylvania Supreme Court only takes cases which it decides are significant enough from a social standpoint for it to consider," attorney Joe Podraza said Tuesday in an interview with WHP-TV, a CBS-affiliated station in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. The case was pending for about six or seven months before the attorneys were notified it was taking the case.

Justices will hear arguments on this question Podraza posed: "Whether coroners and medical examiners have absolute power, or can they be challenged when the evidence shows they are not only mistaken but grossly mistaken."

It may take over a year for that process to conclude, but it has given an undeniable opening for this case to become a major problem during the campaign if Shapiro is chosen. Shapiro's presence on the ticket is already likely to divide the Democratic Party due to his Jewish heritage and support for Israel. But all the dirt on him that has been coming out won't help him—or the campaign.