US federal prosecutors have dropped the remaining five charges of misuse of election funds against former presidential candidate John Edwards after he was found not guilty several days ago on one count, reports “Global Legal Post.”

According to an AP news agency report in the Washington Post, the US Justice Department said that it will not seek a retrial on five unresolved counts of misuse of campaign funds. The report says that decision has triggered rumblings through the US capital that charges should never have been brought against the ex-North Carolina senator.

The agency report quotes US Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer as defending the authorities’ position by saying they always anticipated the case would be difficult to prove. Nonetheless, he said, ‘the government put forward its best case against Mr Edwards, and I am proud of the skilled and professional way in which our prosecutors …. conducted this trial.

But Mr Breuer continued by saying that his department had decided not to seek a retrial ‘in the interest of justice’.