HARRISBURG — "The cover up is worse than the crime" long ago became the hackneyed cliche of choice regarding allegations that someone accused of wrongdoing also tried to cover their tracks.

The monumental public corruption scandal that currently has the state Capitol in its throes — the alleged diversion of millions in public funds for political campaigns and other illegal purposes — is plenty serious on its own.

But there are indications that the attorney general's investigators may pursue charges that some people destroyed, or at least tried to destroy, incriminating records.

Bill Costopoulos, a Lemoyne attorney with extensive experience dealing with grand jury investigations and defending people charged with obstruction of justice, said he suspects the case is heading in that direction.

Prosecutors often consider overt acts of obstruction to be attempts to subvert their own efforts and therefore can respond as if they had been personally insulted, Costopoulos said. Judges can see obstruction as a threat to the justice system.

"It really goes to the integrity of the one accused," said Costopoulos, who does not represent any bonus investigation defendants or witnesses. "It's one thing to get funds to staffers that did campaign work, it's another thing to be accused of a lack of honor and integrity."

The few public documents to surface in the investigation show obstruction of justice and destruction of evidence has been very much on the minds of state prosecutors.

A footnote buried deep within the 74-page grand jury report that was released July 10 in support of criminal charges against a dozen people with ties to the House Democratic caucus said simply that "matters pertaining to potential obstruction or destruction of evidence remain part of the grand jury's ongoing investigation."

It linked to a section of the jurors' report that discussed the disappearance of written documentation regarding the use of compensatory time by defendant Rachel Manzo to perform campaign work in the run-up to the 2006 primary election.

The same notation was affixed to a description of how leave records that cover 2004-05 are missing for another defendant, House Democratic staff lawyer Jeff Foreman.