Last week’s conviction of Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice Joan Orie Melvin, along with her aide and sister, Janine Orie, for using state-paid staff and resources on campaign work, adds more scandal-tainted names to the state’s wall of shame.

Using state-paid staff for campaign work is illegal, but apparently it’s been common across Pennsylvania.

Having staffers do campaign and re-election work is what snared Justice Orie Melvin, Janine Orie and a third sister, former state Sen. Jane Orie, who already is in state prison after having been convicted of similar crimes last year.

With the Orie sisters’ convictions, it’s worth recalling the long run of political corruption trials that made headlines in the state over the past several years.

In 2009, former state Sen. Vincent Fumo, D-Phila., was convicted on more than 100 charges of misusing public funds, his Senate staff and the resources of two nonprofit organizations in Philadephia with which he had close ties. Fumo was brought down by federal prosecutors who alleged that he had misused more than $2 million in state funds and nonprofit resources for his own personal benefit.

Fumo was found guilty on 137 charges of fraud, tax evasion and obstruction of justice and is serving time in a federal prison.

In 2007, the public learned about a major Harrisburg scandal that became known as Bonusgate, involving mostly House Democrats and the use of $2.3 million of taxpayer money to pay legislative staffers for campaign work. A Pittsburgh newspaper broke the story after finding a high correlation between big year-end bonuses and aides who did campaign work.

Some of those caught up in the Bonusgate scandal include former state Rep. Mike Veon, D-Beaver, and former state Rep. Bill DeWeese, D-Greene, both top-ranking legislative leaders with long careers in Harrisburg.

Then, away from the capital, Pennsylvanians were shocked by a scandal in Luzerne County in which two county judges sentenced youths to private, for-profit juvenile detention centers in exchange for payoffs. Two senior judges were sentenced to 28- and 17-year terms in federal prison for the Kids for Cash affair.

In addition to being caught up in the Bonusgate scandal, Veon was also found guilty of misusing funds of a nonprofit group he formed and controlled, called the Beaver Iniative for Growth (BIG). Veon and a top aide were found guilty of misusing the agency’s funds, which included about $10 million in state grants, for political and personal gain.

Overall, the Bonusgate scandal led to 20 convictions or guilty pleas.

While Democrats starred in the Bonusgate scandal, it was Republicans who were caught up in the Computergate affair. In that case, John Perzel, a former speaker of the state House of Representatives, was sentenced to five years in prison after admitting that he had used $10 milliion in taxpayer funds to buy computer hardware and software that was primarly used by GOP leaders to track voters and voter patterns to help Republicans win elections.

Though no individual names played starring roles in some other Harrisburg scandals, it’s worth remembering the 2005 pay-raise scandal in which state lawmakers approved major pay raises for themselves in a 2 a.m. vote that was preceded by no advance notice and no public debate.

A few years earlier, state lawmakers awarded themselves a 50 percent pension increase in what is known as the pension grab of 2001. After giving themselves the big pension boost, which is a part of the current pension crisis facing Pennsylvania taxpayers, state lawmakers quickly followed up their self-serving vote with a vote to give 25 percent pension increases to other state employees, including public school teachers.

The Orie convictions are just another reminder of the culture of entitlement and self-interest that has been too common in Pennsylvania state government.