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Another governor heading for prison?

April 28, 2008

Springfield Journal-Register

Mike Robinson

CHICAGO — The high-stakes courtroom drama was all about politics, patronage and payoffs. Illinoisans watched in fascination as George Ryan, the once-mighty Republican governor, fought to avoid a one-way ticket to federal prison but lost. And now they wonder: Will his Democratic successor, Rod Blagojevich, be next?

“I think the governor is in extraordinarily big trouble,” Cindi Canary, director of the nonpartisan, foundation-funded Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, said last week as Blagojevich’s problems grew.

The governor’s name has surfaced repeatedly in the federal corruption trial of Antoin “Tony” Rezko, the Chicago real estate developer and fast-food tycoon who raised more than $1.6 million for Blagojevich’s campaign fund.

Rezko, who became one of the most trusted members of Blagojevich’s inner circle, is accused of using that clout to gain control of two powerful boards and engineer a $7 million kickback scheme. Rezko denies that he took part in any such scheme.

The governor has been accused of no wrongdoing; none of the charges in the Rezko case says that the governor has committed a crime.

His spokeswoman, Abby Ottenhoff, says claims about Blagojevich that have come out at the trial are fictitious. “We don’t do business that way,” she says.

But the seven weeks of testimony in the Rezko trial thus far have included suggestions that Blagojevich may have rewarded a campaign contributor with a job on the state payroll and promised big-money state contracts to a prominentfundraiser if he would join the governor’s team.

Politics watchers are buzzing and some lawmakers pushing for a ballot measure that would let voters decide on a constitutional amendment to allow the recall of top elected officials.

Stuart Levine, the government’s star witness, testified that when he flew home with Blagojevich from a fundraiser in New York in October 2003, he thanked the governor for reappointing him to a key state board.

“Never discuss any state board with me,” Levine quoted Blagojevich as telling him that day. “You discuss those with either Tony Rezko or (campaign fundraiser) Chris Kelly. But you stick with us, and you will do very well for yourself.”

“What did you take (the governor) to mean by that?” assistant U.S. attorney Christopher Niewoehner asked Levine.

“I took it to mean that I would have an opportunity to make a lot of money,” Levine said.

Attorney Joseph Cari, who has pleaded guilty to attempted extortion, testified that he had phoned an investment firm wanting to do business with the $40 billion state fund that pays the pensions of retired teachers.

He said he told them that if they wanted their $800,000 allocation they had to sign a contract to pay a $750,000 fee to a total stranger.

An executive of the private equity firm, Clyde Robinson, told the jury that he was stunned to hear Cari’s explanation for the bizarre contract.

“That’s the way the governor handles patronage here,” he quoted Cari as saying.

Cari, a former finance chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said Blagojevich had confided that he had plans to run for office beyond the governorship and that there would be legal work, investment banking work and consulting work for those who helped.

Former Illinois Finance Authority executive director Ali Ata is due to take the stand this week, and prosecutors say he is willing to testify that he delivered a $25,000 campaign contribution to Rezko’s office while Blagojevich was present.

While the three men sat at a conference table with the check on the table, he says Blagojevich asked Rezko if he had spoken to Ata about a job on the state payroll. Ata says that when he later contributed another $25,000, Blagojevich told him the state job should be one in which he could “make some money.”

That ignited fresh outrage at the Statehouse in Springfield.

“How many of our governors have to go to jail before we wake up?” asked state Rep. Jack Franks, D-Woodstock. “We’ve become a laughingstock.”

Over the last four decades, four former Illinois governors have faced federal indictments and three were convicted.

Republican William Stratton was charged with tax fraud. He beat the rap, but Democrats Otto Kerner and Dan Walker went to federal prison.

The Ryan scandal began with charges that drivers license examiners had taken payoffs from unqualified truck drivers when he was secretary of state and ended with his 2006 racketeering conviction. Now 73, Ryan is serving 61/2 years in the federal correctional camp in Terre Haute, Ind.

He was convicted of killing an investigation of drivers license bribery, using state resources in his campaigns and steering state leases and contracts to old friends and lobbyists who in turn showered him with goodies ranging from vacations in Jamaica and Mexico to a free golf bag.

But before that happened, Scott Fawell — who masterminded Ryan’s campaigns for a decade and was one of the most trusted members of Ryan’s inner circle — was convicted by a jury of racketeering and later pleaded guilty to bid rigging. He became a star witness at the Ryan trial.

Some wonder if Rezko could eventually be the next Fawell.

If Rezko is convicted and gets a stiff enough prison sentence, will he start talking to federal prosecutors?

And if so, could he tell them anything to incriminate the governor?

Legal experts caution against jumping to conclusions.

“There’s a lot of smoke,” says Northwestern University law professor Ronald Allen, an authority on criminal law. But how much fire is unclear.

He said there is no way to know if the pattern in the Ryan case will be duplicated; only the prosecutors and the grand jury know all that has been uncovered so far and they are closed-mouthed.

Nevertheless the latest disclosures have raised eyebrows statewide, especially after last week’s disclosure by Ata. And federal prosecutors have been investigating hiring fraud and related matters in the Blagojevich administration for at least two years.

“They are building a case against Rod Blagojevich brick by brick,” said Roosevelt University political scientist Paul Green. “And this is a huge brick.”