Another one bites the dust.  Former state Sen. Malcolm Smith was convicted Thursday of operating a big buck bribery scheme aimed at getting him elected mayor of New York City.  A jury convicted Smith and former Queens GOP leader Vincent Tabone in the scheme, which involved getting the once-powerful Democratic majority leader on the GOP line for the 2013 mayoral race.  Assistant U.S. Attorney Perry Carbone had described the case to jurors as a story “about a man who wanted to be mayor and the men who were willing to be bought.”  He accused Smith of having engineered a $200,000 bribery scheme to get himself on the ballot.  Smith’s lawyer, Gerald Shargel, had contended that the feds had tried to entrap his client, and that everything Smith did was on the up and up.  Prosecutors said Tabone accepted $20,000 during a boozy dinner at Sparks Steak House in Midtown on Smith’s behalf from a man who turned out to be an undercover FBI agent.  Smith faces up to 45 years behind bars, while Tabone faces a maximum of 25, although neither are expected to get the max when they’re sentenced by Judge Kenneth Karas later this year.  The four-week trial was actually the second for Smith and Tabone — the first last year ended in a mistrial for them, but resulted in the conviction of one of their co-conspirators, former city Councilman Daniel Halloran.  The case against the dirty pols was brought by the office of Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara, who has since brought corruption charges against now-former state Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver.
Smith, the ex-Democratic majority leader, tried to run for mayor in 2013 as a Republican by paying party bosses to get onto the ballot.