Bob Graham blames a news media-spurred “lynch mob” for his downfall from a very, very lucrative job running an agency that was supposed to be helping senior citizens in some southern West Virginia counties.

Fair enough. We in the media are perfectly capable of dishing out criticism, so we ought to be able to act as targets, too.

But what, precisely, did the media — including this newspaper and others throughout the state — do to Graham?

During an interview published in The Register-Herald of Beckley, Graham said news media coverage helped to convince federal prosecutors that they should file charges against him in 2006. Graham was accused of 31 charges, and spent more than 13 months in prison after being convicted of one.

Graham had been director of the Council on Aging in Wyoming County and had built it into quite an operation. He was convicted of cashing in unused sick leave without getting approval of the council’s board of directors. A federal appeals court ruled that the conviction should be overturned — that Graham indeed had obtained all the board approval he needed. So, Graham was released.

To our knowledge, Graham was not accused in news reports of committing any crime — only of profiting handsomely from his job as director of the agency for senior citizens. He enjoyed a big salary, a luxury vehicle paid for the the agency, and various other “perks.