White-Collar Crime
Rezko Convicted of 16 of 24 Counts in Illinois Political Corruption Case
Posted Jun 4, 2008, 02:57 pm CST
By Martha Neil
Updated: A federal jury reached a verdict today in a much-watched political corruption trial of an Illinois real estate developer who made since-returned campaign contributions to Sen. Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.
Antoin ''Tony'' Rezko was found guilty of 2 counts of money laundering; guilty of 2 of 6 counts of corrupt solicitation; guilty of 12 of 15 counts of mail and/or wire fraud; and not guilty on 1 count of attempted extortion, reports a local ABC News affiliate. The case involved alleged scheming to get kickbacks from companies seeking to do business with the state of Illinois.
"The 10-woman, two-man jury deliberated for parts of 13 days before convicting Rezko of scheming with Stuart Levine, a longtime Republican insider, to extort millions of dollars from firms seeking state business or regulatory approval," the Chicago Tribune recounts in a breaking news story.
As discussed in earlier ABAJournal.com posts, the Rezko trial featured dramatic testimony on a multiplicity of topics. Among them: testimony by Levine, the government's star witness, who is an attorney and businessman, about his own fast-lane lifestyle and claims that a Rezko associate who was a Republican heavyweight tried to pull strings in the Bush administration to get U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald fired and end the Rezko prosecution.
Additional coverage:
New York Times: "Fund-Raiser Convicted in Illinois Bribery Scheme"
The Trail (Washington Post): "Rezko Convicted of Influence Peddling"
ABAJournal.com: "Rezko Defense Rests Without Calling Any Witnesses"
Updated at 5:52 p.m., central time, to include Washington Post coverage.
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