Illinois: Looks Like George Ryan Guilty On All Counts

[Annie]

Couldn't happen to a nicer guy:

http://cbs2chicago.com/politics/local_story_107111835.html

CBS) CHICAGO A federal jury in Chicago has found former Governor George Ryan and businessman Larry Warner guilty on all charges after a five-month trial in federal court.

A racketeering conspiracy charge included in the 22-count indictment carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison.

The jury deliberated for ten days before returning its verdict, ending the state's biggest political corruption trial in decades.

Ryan was charged with running state government for the profit of his friends, family and himself, and with trying to cover up a bribes-for-licenses scandal that ultimately led to his indictment.

The verdict comes nearly three weeks after U.S. District Judge Rebecca Pallmeyer dismissed two jurors for allegedly lying about their criminal records. The judge denied the defense's request for a mistrial.

After adding two alternates to the panel on March 28, Pallmeyer instructed the six women and six men to start over as though two weeks of deliberations had never occurred. The initial jury began deliberating on March 13.

The trial, which included testimony from 77 witnesses, lasted 23 weeks.

The indictment alleged that for more than a decade, as secretary of state and then governor, Ryan took payoffs, gifts and vacations in return for letting associates profit from steering government contracts and leases. He was charged with racketeering conspiracy, mail fraud, making false statements to investigators, tax fraud and filing false tax returns.

Prosecutors alleged that Ryan gave lobbyist and co-defendant Larry Warner all but free reign to see that leases and contracts in the secretary of state's office went to Warner's clients and that cash collected from state vendors and landlords was then funneled back to Ryan.

Warner was charged with racketeering conspiracy, mail fraud, extortion and making illegal financial transactions.

Defense attorney Dan Webb said there was no proof that Ryan ever took bribes. Ryan, who was a dedicated public servant and a humble former pharmacist, had no savings and couldn�t even afford to re-decorate his Kankakee home, Webb said.

The defense claimed the contracts and leases Ryan approved were good for taxpayers and the trips and cash he received were simply gifts.

Ryan, 72, a Republican known worldwide as a leading critic of the death penalty, gradually became the focus of the corruption investigation that began even before his 1998 election as governor. The growing scandal was a factor in Ryan's 2001 decision not to seek a second term.

The charges grew out of the federal government's Operation Safe Road, which initially focused on bribes exchanged for drivers licenses but over seven years expanded into a full-blown investigation of political corruption when Ryan was secretary of state and later governor.

In November 1994, a Wisconsin expressway fiery accident killed six children of the Rev. Scott and Janet Willis. The accident has been blamed on a truck driver whose license may have been obtained with payoff money from a woman raising Ryan campaign funds.

That incident touched off the federal license for bribes probe that eventually led to Ryan�s indictment.

Ryan's campaign committee has been found guilty of racketeering along with his former campaign manager and chief of staff, Scott Fawell, who is now serving a 6 1/2-year sentence.

Ryan, an old-school politician, was elected to five terms in the state House before serving two four-year terms as secretary of state beginning in 1990.

He was elected governor in 1998, but retired after just one term as the so-called licenses-for-bribes scandal grew.

While his popularity plummeted in his home state, Ryan was winning widespread praise nationally and internationally as a leading critic of capital punishment.

Ryan declared a moratorium on capital punishment in Illinois after it was discovered that 13 wrongfully convicted men had been sent to death row.

In January 2003, just before leaving office, he pardoned four condemned prisoners and commuted the death sentences of 167 others to life in prison.

Critics accused Ryan of using the death penalty issue to deflect the scandal arising from the disclosures of corruption. Supporters nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Ryan is the third Illinois governor indicted in the past 40 years. Otto Kerner, who served from 1961-1968, was convicted of bribery. Dan Walker, who served from 1973-1977, was convicted on charges related to financial dealings after he left office.

Racketeering is punishable by up to 20 years in prison; mail fraud and making false statements to authorities are punishable by up to 5 years in prison; tax fraud and filing a false tax return are punishable by up to 3 years in prison.

Ryan is married to his childhood sweetheart, Lura Lynn Ryan. They are the parents to six children, five daughters and one son. They have 13 grandchildren.

 

[5stringJeff]

Good riddance.

 

[Annie]

Good riddance.

Illinois has been cursed with crud like him.

http://www.restoretrust.us/cost/

The Cost of Corruption


History of Illinois Corruption

(From Associated Press reports)

1859 - Former Gov. Joel Matteson is indicted by a grand jury - which then votes not to indict him - for allegedly defrauding the state out of tens of thousands of dollars by cashing in old government scrip that already had been redeemed. He avoided prosecution by paying back some of the money he claimed he hadn't stolen.

1921 - Gov. Lennington Small is indicted on charges of conspiracy and embezzlement of state funds for an alleged scheme while he was state treasurer. He is accused of depositing state money into a dormant bank and then loaning it to businesses at a higher interest rate than he paid back the state and pocketing the difference. He is acquitted.

1956 - State auditor Orville Hodge pleads guilty to embezzling more than $1.5 million in state funds, money that helped fund a lifestyle that included two planes and homes in Illinois and Florida.

1965 - Former Gov. William Stratton is accused of improperly using campaign funds and is indicted on federal tax evasion charges. He is acquitted.

1970 - Former Secretary of State Paul Powell dies, leaving others to discover in his home shoe boxes stuffed with hundreds of thousands of dollars. No crime is ever alleged but neither Powell nor anyone else ever explained where the money came from.

1973 - Former Gov. Otto Kerner is convicted of bribery, conspiracy, income tax evasion, perjury and mail fraud after he bought stock in a horse track at a reduced rate in exchange for giving the track's owner preferential treatment. He serves 20 months in federal prison.

1976 - Five present and former state legislators are convicted for taking part in a bribery scheme to raise load limits for concrete trucks.

1977 - Two former state representatives are convicted of conspiracy and mail fraud in a scheme to extort money to kill a bill opposed by the rental car industry. Prosecutors described it as a "fetcher bill" that was proposed to solicit a bribe to have it killed.

1980 - Former Attorney General William Scott, known for taking on corporate giants and industrial polluters, is convicted by a federal court jury of underreporting his income for 1972. During the trial, prosecutors contend he took campaign money and "traveled around the world like a sheik."

1987 - Former Gov. Dan Walker pleads guilty to fraud and perjury charges for fraudulently obtaining bank loans after he left office. He serves 17 1/2 months in federal prison.

1992 - Former State Treasurer Jerry Cosentino pleads guilty to bank fraud, admitting to writing millions of dollars in bad checks to maintain a trucking company.

2005 - Former Gov. George Ryan awaits trial on racketeering charges. He is accused of accepting free vacations and other perks while doling out favors such as lucrative state contracts to lobbyist friends starting in 1990, when he was elected secretary of state. He has pleaded not guilty.

 

[Annie]

Yahoo! News Explains how Ryan used Illinois death row to try and 'reform' himself, (unintentionally I'm sure, but not lost on the voters-see how Blue Illinois has become...)


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060417/ap_on_re_us/governor_s_trial

Jury Finds Former Ill. Gov. Ryan Guilty

By MIKE ROBINSON, Associated Press Writer 10 minutes ago

Former Gov. George Ryan, who drew international praise when he commuted the sentences of everyone on Illinois' death row, was convicted of racketeering and fraud Monday in a corruption scandal that ended his political career in 2003.

The 72-year-old Republican faces up to 20 years in prison for racketeering conspiracy, the most serious charge against him in the 22-count indictment.

The jury found Ryan guilty on all charges, including fraud, obstructing the Internal Revenue Service and lying to the FBI.

Co-defendant Larry Warner, a Chicago businessman and Ryan friend, was also convicted of racketeering conspiracy, as well as mail fraud, attempted extortion, illegally structuring bank withdrawals and money laundering.

Ryan was accused of steering big-money state contracts and leases, including a $25 million IBM computer deal, to his friends and political insiders while he was secretary of state in the 1990s and then as governor starting in 1999.

In return for help, he was rewarded with annual winter vacations in Jamaica, stays in Cancun and Palm Springs and gifts ranging from a golf bag to $145,000 in loans to his brother's business, prosecutors said.

Warner, 67, was one of those beneficiaries and raked in $3 million from Ryan-era deals, according to the office of U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald — who during the trial was also leading the federal investigation into the leak of CIA officer Valerie Plame's identity.

U.S. District Judge Rebecca R. Pallmeyer summoned attorneys to her courtroom Monday for the verdict to be read.

The jury's decision ends the state's biggest political corruption trial in decades, and draws a conclusion on the long career of a politician who gained international fame as a death penalty critic but left office in 2003 amid a widespread corruption scandal.

The charges stemmed from an eight-year investigation of corruption, starting at the drivers licensing bureau and eventually reaching the governor's office.

Ryan was indicted about a year after he left office. Warner allegedly made $3 million from Ryan-era deals.

Neither man took the stand during their trial, but both repeatedly said nothing they did was illegal.

 

[CrimsonWhite]

Couldn't happen to a nicer guy:

http://cbs2chicago.com/politics/local_story_107111835.html

I credit George Ryan with the problem the Illinois GOP is now facing. I'm pretty sure that the only person that can fix it is Jim Edgar.

 

[Annie]

I credit George Ryan with the problem the Illinois GOP is now facing. I'm pretty sure that the only person that can fix it is Jim Edgar.

Jim Edgar is out, his wife made sure of that. Too bad about his heart, but I don't blame her.

 

[CrimsonWhite]

Jim Edgar is out, his wife made sure of that. Too bad about his heart, but I don't blame her.

Unfortunately, you are correct. I just hope Judy Baar Topinka is up to the challenge of sending Govenor Blagojevich back to Dick Mell's house.

 

[Annie]

Unfortunately, you are correct. I just hope Judy Baar Topinka is up to the challenge of sending Govenor Blagojevich back to Dick Mell's house.

I don't know anyone other the lockstep GOP folk that are going for Judy. Since she undermined Oberweiss and brought in Keyes last go round, her stock plummeted with those I know.

 

[CrimsonWhite]

I don't know anyone other the lockstep GOP folk that are going for Judy. Since she undermined Oberweiss and brought in Keyes last go round, her stock plummeted with those I know.

It plummeted with me too. My absentee ballot went to Ryan. However, Topinka is the GOP candidate and is, I can't believe I'm saying this, the hope of the Illinois GOP.

 

[Annie]

It plummeted with me too. My absentee ballot went to Ryan. However, Topinka is the GOP candidate and is, I can't believe I'm saying this, the hope of the Illinois GOP.

If there isn't an alternative, I'll vote for her because Rod is just bad news. I doubt that she could be worse, but heh, it's Illinois. :coffee3:

 

[CrimsonWhite]

If there isn't an alternative, I'll vote for her because Rod is just bad news. I doubt that she could be worse, but heh, it's Illinois. :coffee3:

I'll give ya that. God bless our Land of Lincoln.

 

[CrimsonWhite]

I don't know anyone other the lockstep GOP folk that are going for Judy. Since she undermined Oberweiss and brought in Keyes last go round, her stock plummeted with those I know.

What is it with her and Oberweiss? He could be a great leader in the GOP, if given the oppurtunity.

 

[Annie]

What is it with her and Oberweiss? He could be a great leader in the GOP, if given the oppurtunity.

Maybe, maybe not, but at least he was from Illinois. Now the truth is, what land West of here he doesn't own, the Hasterts do, but again that's the way of the world.

 

[CrimsonWhite]

Maybe, maybe not, but at least he was from Illinois. Now the truth is, what land West of here he doesn't own, the Hasterts do, but again that's the way of the world.

Do you think the GOP will ever produce another Thompson or Edgar? I'm hoping its me. I would love to come back home and run for Govenor someday. Growing up south of I-64, pretty much blows that chance though. lol