Governor Spitzer could soon find himself beset on all sides by legal proceedings, as the Assembly weighs impeachment, federal prosecutors consider indictment, and an attorney disciplinary committee mulls disbarment.

The many prosecutors and tribunals to hound the governor are in a position to seek punishments ranging from a felony conviction down to a day at “John School” — a program in Washington, D.C., for men caught soliciting prostitutes.

Mr. Spitzer spent yesterday, a day after the disclosure that while in Washington he was the client of a pricey prostitution service, holed up in his Fifth Avenue apartment. The New York Sun is reporting that the governor intends to resign today.

It is not clear whether his resignation is linked to a deal hammered out between Mr. Spitzer and Manhattan’s U.S. attorney, Michael Garcia, who is reportedly investigating Mr. Spitzer’s alleged liaisons and the money he used to fund them. Nor was the Sun able to confirm whether negotiations between Mr. Spitzer’s attorney, Michele Hirshman, and Mr. Garcia or his deputies had even yet begun.

A decision by Mr. Spitzer to resign is expected to placate prosecutors to some degree, legal experts say.

Although law enforcement, including the IRS, began investigating Mr. Spitzer’s finances five months ago, federal prosecutors may take more time and search for additional evidence before deciding what, if any, charges to bring. Legal experts have speculated that prosecutors may try to bring charges related to transporting a prostitute across state lines or to money laundering and other financial crimes.

Additional evidence of the governor’s links to the alleged prostitution service, called Emperors Club VIP, may turn up from the search warrant executed last Thursday on the apartment of a man and woman charged with running the prostitution agency. There have been no public reports so far to suggest that investigators have yet interviewed Mr. Spitzer’s inner circle, bodyguards, or many of the alleged prostitutes who worked for the agency.

Independent of any prosecutorial decisions by Mr. Garcia in New York, the U.S. attorney in Washington, Jeffrey Taylor, can determine whether to prosecute Mr. Spitzer for misdemeanor charges of violating the district’s anti-prostitution law. The statute of limitations does not expire until February, 2011.

Men in Washington who are charged with soliciting a prostitute often resolve the case by pleading guilty and attending a day’s worth of lectures delivered by an anti-vice detective, a health care worker, and a former prostitute.

In Albany, a Republican assemblyman, James Tedisco, yesterday tried to fix a deadline for Mr. Spitzer as the governor pondered his future. Mr. Tedisco, of Schenectady, pledged to try to initiate impeachment proceedings if Mr. Spitzer was still in office tomorrow. The call for impeachment did not appear to gain much traction among assemblymen. No petition was under way.

The last state official to be stripped of office after an impeachment proceeding was Governor Sulzer in 1913.

Impeaching Mr. Spitzer would require a majority of the 150-member assembly. The case would then be heard by the Court for the Trial of Impeachment— which is composed of the seven members of the state’s top court, the Court of Appeals, plus every state senator except Mr. Spitzer’s chief political rival, Joseph Bruno. Under the constitution, the temporary senate president, Senator Bruno, is not a part of impeachment proceedings.

Conviction requires a two-thirds vote, and the penalty can range from verbal censure to removal of office.

The state Constitution provides no guidelines for how impeachment proceedings are to be conducted. One political historian, Joseph Zimmerman, a professor at Rockefeller College of Public Affairs at SUNY Albany, said he “would assume” that the chief prosecutor would be the attorney general, Andrew Cuomo. Mr. Cuomo is widely considered a contender for governor in the next election.

Impeachment does not protect Mr. Spitzer from criminal prosecution by the executive branch. On the other hand, criminal prosecution, if resulting in a felony conviction for Mr. Spitzer, might make impeachment moot: state law prohibits felons from holding office.

A felony conviction also means that Mr. Spitzer, a lawyer by training and profession, would lose his law license. That could limit Mr. Spitzer’s employment in the coming years.

Even without any criminal conviction, an attorney disciplinary committee is likely to investigate Mr. Spitzer’s reported sexual liaisons.
“Ultimately it’s going to be an issue for the disciplinary committee to look into,” the president of the city’s bar association, Barry Kamins, said. “It’s not going to happen today or tomorrow, but it is something that will be in play.”

The attorney disciplinary committee in Manhattan can launch investigations of lawyers on its own accord without waiting for a written complaint, he said. While the committee cannot disbar attorneys on its own, it can refer cases to a panel of appellate judges to consider punishments.

Mr. Kamins said that he is aware of cases in which attorneys found to have patronized prostitutes have been “privately admonished” by the disciplinary committee. But he added that a pattern of such behavior could prompt the disciplinary committee to refer the case to judges for harsher punishment.