A Just Cause (8 page)

In 2008 Balmoral Park, a horse-racing track located in south suburban Chicago, had hired Alonzo “Lon” Monk as a lobbyist. A former sports agent in California, Monk had been Blagojevich's law school buddy. He was a trusted confidant, and upon taking office, Blagojevich appointed Monk as chief of staff. Trading on his relationship with the governor, Monk left the Blagojevich administration and became an Illinois lobbyist. It was well known that anyone who wanted access to the governor hired Lon Monk. He soon had a long list of clients and was reportedly making more than $1 million a year after leaving state government.
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Monk was later identified on the FBI recordings as Lobbyist 1.

Quoting from the criminal complaint, Ellis reported on conversations between the governor and Monk concerning a contribution of $100,000 from an owner of Balmoral Park. The recorded conversation made it clear that the contribution was in exchange for the governor signing the bill. It was also clear that Blagojevich was fully aware of the extortion. In one segment of the recordings, Monk urged the governor to call the racetrack owner personally, and Blagojevich suggested what he should use as his “reason” for the call (140–41).

Moving to another portion of the criminal complaint, Ellis told the committee of two individuals named in the complaint, Ali Ata and Joseph Cari. Ata had served as the executive director of the Illinois Finance Authority. Cari was a former Democratic National Committee finance chairman and a director with Health Point, a private equity firm that had received $35 million in investment contracts with the Illinois Teachers Retirement System in 2003. Both men were entangled in Operation Board Games, the federal government's ongoing investigation of the Blagojevich administration, and both pleaded guilty to federal crimes and testified against Blagojevich confidant Tony Rezko.
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As part of his cooperation agreement, Ata pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI and to tax fraud. He testified that he had given a total of $50,000 to Blagojevich as payment for a position with the IFA. Cari pleaded guilty to attempted extortion of JER Partners, a real estate investment firm that was seeking investment capital from the Illinois Teachers Retirement System (151–57).
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At the time of Blagojevich's arrest, both men were cooperating with the government.

Portions of the testimony Ata and Cari provided to the federal prosecutors were included in the criminal complaint and offered ample evidence of the involvement of Rod Blagojevich in both the selling of the IFA position and the attempted extortion of JER. Ellis recounted the numerous meetings and discussions among Blagojevich, Ata, and Rezko. He also reported Ata's testimony that he had handed money to Rezko, who later, in Ata's presence, gave the money to Rod Blagojevich. Cari testified that he had been involved with Blagojevich, Rezko, and fund-raisers Chris Kelly and Stuart Levine and had been told that he could profit from raising money for Blagojevich. He had been told, he testified, of a plan for Chris Kelly and Tony Rezko to pick consultants for the businesses that receive contracts from the state. Rezko informed Cari that he had a personal relationship with Rod Blagojevich and that the governor's chief of staff, Lon Monk, would work to ensure Rezko's choice of consultants. Business firms would be required to hire consultants picked by Rezko and Kelly, and those consultants would then funnel part of their fees to the Blagojevich campaign. Rezko also informed Cari that in exchange for raising money for Blagojevich, the administration would be financially helpful to Cari (154–57).
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Having reported the numerous charges of wrongdoing, Ellis was now finished with the summary of the criminal complaint. Surprisingly, given the deeds that had just been presented, the audience did not react with shock or amazement. For many in the audience, the array of charges was
familiar. Because of the almost continuous media coverage since the arrest, the coverage of the recently concluded Rezko trial, and the ongoing reporting of the investigations and alleged investigations of the governor's office, the public had become well acquainted with the exploits of Blagojevich and his co-conspirators. Here it all was, neatly laid out in the criminal complaint and summarized by the house counsel.

Barbara Currie informed Edward Genson that the committee would be happy to “hear some brief remarks.” Genson incredulously responded, “Brief?” and Currie replied calmly, “Please.” A feeling of expectation seemed to spread through the room. How would Blagojevich's counsel respond? Ed Genson sat looking rumpled and at times befuddled, hunched over his papers, moving occasionally with lurching motions. The audience was not fooled by his deliberately expressed confusion and awkwardness; perception was an essential part of the courtroom lawyer's performance. Genson knew he was in unfamiliar territory, and he had to try to achieve as much leverage as possible despite the committee's restrictive rules.

It became immediately clear that Genson was not going to be given any courtroom leeway. The committee rules did not give the defense the opportunity to cross-examine witnesses, but the seasoned defense attorney began his remarks by questioning the validity of Ellis's use of the criminal complaint as the source of the charges presented. In hectoring tones, he began questioning Ellis. Ellis asked Genson if he was being questioned. Genson replied that he was, and Ellis objected, stating that the committee rules did not provide for the governor's representatives to cross-examine him. Currie sustained Ellis's objection and informed Genson that cross-examination was not allowed.

Appearing to reluctantly accept his limitations, Genson seemingly acquiesced to giving a brief statement but immediately referred to what he called “inaccuracies” and again presented a question to Ellis. Again Ellis appealed to Currie that he was being cross-examined. The room became tense. Genson, given the circumstances, was doing his best to challenge the basis of Ellis's statements, the criminal complaint. He postulated that probable cause had not yet been determined from the criminal complaint, pointed out there had been no indictment, and challenged John Fritchey's earlier remarks that probable cause had already been determined.

Careen Gordon, a Democratic committee member and a lawyer, jumped to the defense of Ellis. A former Grundy County prosecutor, she voiced that probable cause had been determined and had been the basis for the
wiretaps. The conversation grew heated when Gordon told Genson that he should go back to practicing criminal law and Genson responded that Gordon should go back to law school. Genson contended that the content of the wiretaps should not be allowed as evidence in the hearing, because under the standards of due process, his client had not been given the opportunity to test their accuracy. He claimed that Rod Blagojevich had not heard the wiretap recordings and that he could not determine whether the statements in the criminal complaint were taken out of context. He also argued that for the committee to proceed using a summary of the wiretaps before they could be examined and rebutted by defense counsel “was unfair and illegal” (170).

Next, Genson brought up the mysterious identification of people in the wiretapped conversations, referred to as Hospital Executive 1 and Deputy Governor A, and asserted that he was not able to discover who these people were. In regard to selling the US Senate seat, he claimed that there was no proof that any illegal exchange had occurred. Jack Franks interrupted. Franks and his father, who was also an attorney, were both acquaintances of Ed Genson's, and Genson made a polite reference to their relationship. Franks told Genson that the committee's purpose was not to find guilt and that perhaps Genson's argument should wait for “a different forum” (172). Genson responded that he was requesting due process from the committee. He did not have subpoena power but argued that if he did, he would call the mysteriously identified people and question them. The use of hearsay as evidence was unfair, and it was unfair to use anonymous people, he said. To deprive Rod Blagojevich of the right to confront his accusers was also unfair. Genson attacked the accusations made by Ata and Cari and reminded the committee that Ali Ata is an admitted perjurer and that Joe Cari is an admitted extortionist. Stuart Levine, Genson told the committee, was facing life imprisonment. He was involved in bribery, tax fraud, defrauding the estate of a business associate, and using illegal narcotics. “This is the character of the statements of Mr. Levine,” Genson said (179–80).

The defense counsel continued to summarize his argument against the criminal complaint. He talked about the criterion for impeachment—
cause
—and recalled Ellis speaking of “the line that had to be crossed.” The line had never been drawn before, Genson said, the criterion for impeachment was nebulous, and he did not know of any record of case law that defined the standard of cause. The line for impeachment should be based on evidence and based on due process and, he added, based on confrontation.
Cause, he asserted, must mean something. Speaker Madigan had spoken about due process in his press conference on Monday—in fact, everybody was taking about due process—but due process, Genson reminded the committee, meant consideration of the evidence. To sit and listen to hearsay upon hearsay was inappropriate, he said. He went through the charges offered in the criminal complaint. None of the accusations regarding the Tribune Company had been corroborated. All that had been presented was a man who said he could do something, but there was nothing to prove that the man had talked to anyone, and Tribune Company officials were not at the hearing to confirm or deny the accusation. “Just people jabbering,” Genson said (183).

With regard to Children's Memorial Hospital, there was “no evidence that anyone did anything wrong,” and concerning the US Senate seat, Genson again stressed that there was no evidence that anyone had done anything wrong. The lawyer concluded by telling the committee that he could not convince them that he was right in the short period of time allotted to him and that it was incumbent that the panel members read the charges “one at a time and determine whether it's just somebody who says inappropriate things in a two-month wiretap” (184). The committee, he said, was a jury, and each member had to decide whether what he or she heard was sufficient to “kick a guy out of office” and “whether it's enough and whether it's time” (185). The standard for impeachment in Illinois had never been set. It was not a visceral standard, not intuitive, but a standard that the impeachment panel had to determine.

The reaction to Genson's remarks was difficult to measure. His remarks did not end the day's proceedings or even a portion of the proceedings. There was no pause to contemplate what had been said. The hearing continued with Currie recognizing the Republican spokesman Jim Durkin. The former Cook County prosecutor took issue with Genson's claims that the hearing did not allow due process and that the committee should not listen to hearsay. He reminded Genson that grand juries are allowed to consider hearsay and that the lawyer had been allowed “more process than anybody that's been before the grand jury representing clients” (186). Committee members were capable of “connecting the dots,” and they were going to accept hearsay and make their own determination concerning the value of the documents before them (188).

Genson attempted to cast doubt on the evidence and express skepticism of the process. He did what good defense attorneys do, but the reality was
that he was not in a courtroom. The committee was presented with evidence and would decide, as a grand jury, whether the governor should be tried by the senate. Rod Blagojevich did not have a supporter on the committee, and the few friends he had in the legislature had all taken political cover. The committee had been chosen by the house Democratic and Republican leadership to reach a decision to impeach. Careful consideration had been placed on geography, gender, race, and—most important—opposition to the governor.
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Statements by the committee members to be fair and deliberate notwithstanding, the end result was predetermined. The hearing was a show, but it was not a sham. The vague language in the Illinois Constitution gave the legislature the prerogative to act as it saw fit, and the evidence supporting a resolution of impeachment was overwhelming. The house committee was holding deliberative hearings, but it was acting to begin the removal of the governor.

Administrative Charges, Part I

The third day of hearings saw a noticeably larger crowd of spectators, and there was a perceptible feeling of anticipation. Reporters congregated beneath the historic paintings that hang along the first-floor hallway of the capitol as legislators, staff, and members of the public passed through security and entered room 114. On the previous day the committee had been presented with the criminal charges leveled at the governor; now accusations of malfeasance and maladministration would be offered and representatives of the Blagojevich administration would appear. The committee needed these accusations to build its case and give credence to the cause for impeachment. The committee and David Ellis did not have time to build a case based on evidence derived from any further investigations; they had to go with already available evidence of the governor's past misdeeds.

The accusations Ellis put before the committee were well-documented incidents concerning the ongoing dispute between the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules (JCAR) and the governor's office over the expansion of the state's FamilyCare program, a botched flu vaccine purchase from a foreign manufacturer in violation of US law, and a controversy over the importation of drugs from a foreign country as part of ongoing state health insurance programs, also a violation of US law. Evidence of the flu vaccine purchase and the importation of drugs was contained in an auditor general's audit, performed in response to an investigation by the house
State Government Administration Committee and a subsequent resolution providing for an audit, introduced by committee chairman Jack Franks. A second, routine audit of the Department of Central Management Services, also performed by the Auditor General's Office, uncovered discrepancies and possible wrongdoing concerning the methods used in granting contracts and selecting vendors.