Independent Counsel Paul Ware’s 308-page report on hiring practices at the state’s Probation Department reads a lot like a trashy novel. It’s full of politically juicy material, but in the end it leaves you a bit unsatisfied.

In essence, Ware concludes that individuals with political connections seeking jobs at probation fared much better than candidates with fewer or no political connections. Probation officials won’t be surprised by Ware’s conclusion. After all, that’s what they thought they were supposed to do.

Christopher Bulger, a deputy commissioner and senior legal counsel at probation and the son of former Senate President William Bulger, tells Ware that he was of one mind with Probation Commissioner John O’Brien on manipulating hiring and promotions to benefit job candidates put forward by politically connected individuals.

“I guess I share his view that it happens in a lot of agencies…that this is something that happens everywhere to some degree,” Bulger is quoted as saying.

It’s hard to argue with Bulger’s logic. Whether it’s a government agency or the private sector, the job candidate with the better connections often gets the job. It may be unfair, but that’s life.

To be sure, Ware’s report indicates O’Brien took patronage at his agency to a whole new level. As CommonWealth previously reported, O’Brien and his staff used spreadsheets to track who supported candidates for probation jobs and then made sure those candidates with the most clout behind them got the jobs.

The thinking inside probation was that as long as the job candidate satisfied the position’s minimal qualifications, why not hire the person and curry favor with the lawmaker, judge, district attorney, city councilor, governor, or executive branch official making the recommendation?

It was patently unfair, but from an empire-building perspective the approach worked fabulously. Lawmakers who recommended people for jobs at probation would then vote to boost the budget of probation so more people could be hired. It’s the circle of life on Beacon Hill.

Ware acknowledges in his report that patronage is not unique to probation and that many of the people hired or promoted as a result of the rigged hiring process should have been hired or promoted and were professional and competent.

Ware nevertheless concludes that O’Brien’s rigged hiring process went too far in selecting people based on political connections rather than merit.

“Independent Counsel is realistic that recommendations to state agencies as regards candidates for initial hire or promotion are not unique to probation,” Ware says at the end of his report. “Indeed, even as to probation, such recommendations are neither inappropriate nor inconsistent with fairness and objectivity in and of themselves. This investigation, however, revealed a degree of abuse and systemic corruption in hiring and promotion that cannot be ignored, and which as implemented, became an obstacle to the very principles of hiring articulated in Trial Court policies. That extent of interference with merit hiring and promotion transformed a credible process into a patronage hiring machine. However well-oiled, that machine no longer serves the public interest.”