12Dec/120

Hey Chicago Tribune, what kinda Journalism is that?

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Ernie Souchak, Editor-in-Chief

The traditional rules of journalism apparently don't apply to the Chicago Tribune.  Now it's the rules of "Forward Journalism" that they follow.

For example:

Basic rule #1 - When you get the inside scoop on a wiretap the government's running on a sitting governor, you don't make a decision at 10:20 p.m. to derail the government's investigation, while, at the same time, flushing the biggest news story of the year down the drain with a John Chase phone call warning Gov. Blagojevich that the feds are listening.

Unless you "report" for the Chicago Tribune.

Basic rule # 2 - When you write the self-described definitive book about the Rod Blagojevich affair, as reporters John Chase and Jeff Coen claim to have, and the U.S. Attorney's office publicly takes issue with the honesty of your claims, you back up your story with evidence that supports your words.

Unless you work for the Chicago Tribune

Basic rule #3 -  When the honesty of reporters is challenged by the U.S. government, the Editor stands by his or her reporters, or excepts responsibility for their mistakes and makes the appropriate changes to protect the integrity of the newspaper.

Unless you're an Editor at the Chicago Tribune.

Ever since the U.S. Attorney's Office of the Northern District of Illinois went on the record disputing claims made by Chase and Coen, the two Tribune reporters have been mute, refusing to comment.

Not only are they not responding to troubling accusations from the USAO, Tribune editor Gerould Kern, and the publisher of "Golden," the Chicago Review Press, are, also, hunkered down refusing to comment.

So is that the new style of "Forward Journalism"?

We, at IP2P, subscribe to the American traditional rules of journalism. We call for honest answers from the Tribune, on behalf of the citizens of Chicago, and Illinois.

They deserve the truth

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23Jun/120

What does George Weaver know about 400k Tony Rezko paid to Obama ?

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Ernie Souchak, Editor-in-Chief, Illinois PayToPlay

Tony Rezko's partner Daniel T Frawley shared this letter he wrote to his attorney with Robert Cooley. In this letter Mr. Frawley claims his ex-attorney George Weaver can confirm that he (Frawley) provided cash for Tony Rezko to payoff Barack Obama !  Patrick Fitzgerald's replacement will need to take a look at this.

Perhaps Congressman Joe Walsh will also take notice ? (Special Counsel?)

As for the Chicago SunTimes and the Chicago Tribune, maybe if we hold our breath ?

 

---------- Forwarded message ----------

From: Dan Frawley <Address withheld>
Date: Mon, Jun 13, 2011 at 11:05 AM
Subject: Weaver
To: robert XXXXX <Robert Cooley's email address withheld>

Mark

Here is Weaver's real concern and this is fact not opinion.
Weaver told my sister Kathleen and I this story at his (Weaver's) office
Weaver then repeated the same story to Jeffrey Steinbach a couple of days
later when Weaver called Jeff before Weaver
met with USAO Caroline McNiven and FBI supervisor Pat Murphy.
Weaver then went in and told the same story to the USAO.
Weaver then called me immediately after leaving the USAO office. (Within 5
minutes via pay phone)
Jeff then confirmed to me what Weaver told the USAO after speaking with the
USAO.

Weaver's Explanation in first person:

I did not tell the USAA about the alleged payment from TR to BO because I
was afraid.
I was afraid that all of the news coverage would bring reporters to my door
and they would camp out there.
I was afraid I would be labeled a racist and Dan and Kathy you know I am not
political at all.
I was especially worried about the affect this would have on my son Michael.
I did this to Protect my family and myself from the publicity.

NOW here is the part that George lied to Jeff and the USAO to.
George told them (USA) & Jeff) that he George had a drink with me at the bar in George's office building. (121 N. La Salle St.)George said he told me then and there what Tony Rezko told George regarding BO and the alleged payoff. George Said that the reason for doing so was to hold this information out incase I did not get a good deal from the USAO then George could use this info as the last turn of the screw on TR and get me the best deal. George said that no one would believe me if I did not recall the story George’s way and that my sister and brother would also be indicted

George then went to Jeff and the USAO that story

I had already met with the USAO with Jeff and told the true story. I
originally went along with Weaver’s story because I was worried about my
brother and sister, but after about 10 days I went with Steinbach and
straightened out the misunderstandings. never knew whom TR gave the cash to
all I knew is Weaver Said the money went in cash in plastic grocery sacks to high elected
official. I always assumed it was Rod.

Jeff told me that the USAO knew Weaver lied to them and that USAO has
nothing but disgust and disdain for Weaver.
Jeff said the USAO could charge Weaver with Conspiracy, lying to the FBI and
obstruction of justice.
Of course we do not care about the criminal aspect but the civil

Government law enforcement people can testify to weaver' lying and
malpractice

Were we also have weaver is Weaver told his wife Janice and his mother in
law what happened with BO & TR

We can depose Weavers wife and mother in law.
Weaver was so worried abut involving his family this or the threat of it
along with the publicity is Weaver's Achilles heal.

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19Apr/120

Another Mission Accomplished: Frawley joins Blago and Rezko in the Silence Chamber of Federal Prison

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 <<BREAKING NEWS>>

Thomas Barton, Illinois Pay-to-Play Political Commentator

 

 

On April 19, 2012, Federal Judge Ronald Guzman sentenced Daniel T. Frawley to one year and one day in federal prison.  So Frawley joins Rezko and Blago in the Silence Chamber of federal prison until well after the November election. He reports to jail next August 20.

What Frawley knows about Rezko’s dealings with former Illinois U.S. Senator Barack Obama will be unavailable…until it’s irrelevant.

Let’s review Frawley’s puppet dance with the feds:

He pleads guilty to a crime after the statute of limitations had expired, and agrees to pay 4.4 million dollars restitution to the bank he defrauded.

He becomes a confidential informant in the case the U.S. Attorney’s office builds against Antoin “Tony” Rezko, but doesn’t testify at Rezko’s trial.

He is identified as CI2 in the motion to arrest Rezko, after Nadhmi Auchi sent Rezko enough money to cover those who put up assets for Tony’s bond. This causes the feds to suspect that Tony is about to jump bail and head back to the Middle East. So they arrest Tony.

The feds withhold a check for over three hundred thousand dollars made out to Frawley from Rezko, money that Frawley claims Rezko owes him. (So, where did that money go?)

Frawley is dragged through multiple postponements in his sentencing for the better part of a year, until the November ’12 election is close enough for Frawley to receive enough jail time to keep him in the Silence Chamber until the man Patrick Fitzgerald has been protecting for years is re-elected President.

Implausible explanation?  Not when you step back and survey the pattern of the U.S. Attorney’s catch and release program with regard to those most closely associated with Rezko and Blago.

Frawley was guilty as charged for the crimes he committed years ago. He admitted that. But the way his case has been handled over those years calls into question the motives of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois.

Has it been about fighting crime?  Or, more about protecting corruption at the highest level of the land?

Frawley’s been a dutiful puppet on federal strings.  And here’s his pay-off:

 

 

 

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28Mar/120

Further Update: Details of Frawley v. McMahon “Whistleblower” Lawsuit Just Exposed By Sun Times

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Ernie Souchak, Editor-in-Chief, Illinois PayToPlay

Further Update:

Apparently, in response to articles recently run by the Chicago Sun Times that state, as fact, that a “Whistleblower” lawsuit was filed by Daniel T. Frawley in July 11, 2011,Mayor Rahm Emanuel is proposing to permanently ban an electrical contracting company with ties to Ald. Edward M. Burke (14th) from getting city work because its owners and their husbands allegedly operated phony women- and minority-owned companies that have gotten millions of dollars in city contracts.”

This proposed ban was announced today, March 28, 2012, in the Sun Times.  

His Honor and the paper must have access to a fully-authenticated, signed copy of a date-stamped lawsuit that we, at Illinois PayToPlay cannot locate. If they don’t, their claims of its existence are specious. But let’s reserve judgment.

We need your help.

If you have proof that such a lawsuit was filed, post here on comment board.

If it was filed and sealed in July 2011, it should be available to the public by now. And, if it was filed and remains sealed, how did the Sun Times get a copy? Are there not illegalities involved in leaking a sealed court document? Lastly, if it was never filed, what’s this assault on the McMahon’s all about anyway?

Developing…

Update:

The Chicago Sun Times has now run the second of what it promises is a three part series concerning a whistleblower lawsuit filed by attorneys representing Daniel T. Frawley.  The Sun Times has yet to provide its readers a copy of that lawsuit.  Is it the same one Illinois Pay-To-Play posted below?  If it is not, it is time for the Sun Times to show its readers the lawsuit on which it’s series is based.  

(Originally posted on Illinois Pay-to-Play  3-25-2012)

In an article dated March 24, 2012, the Chicago Sun Times broke the explosive story of a lawsuit filed July 2011 by Daniel T. Frawley, cooperating federal government mole-informant in Patrick Fitzgerald’s investigation of Tony Rezko, and former Rezko business partner.

According to the Sun Times, the lawsuit charges various members of the McMahon family, associated with McMahon-owned businesses, of fraudulent contracting practices.  The reporters wrote that,

“Frank McMahon’s first cousin, Daniel T. Frawley, filed a “whistleblower” lawsuit in federal court last July accusing McMahon Food, C & C and Krystal of actually being run by men, even though the companies are certified as being women-owned and -operated. As a result, Frawley says McMahon Food was able to obtain multimillion-dollar deals with Cook County government, including supplying dairy goods to the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center.”

Illinois PayToPlay recently received a copy of a “whistleblower” lawsuit attributed to Frawley, by a confidential source, that fits the description of the document exposed by the Sun Times. Uncertain of its authenticity at the time, we chose not to make it public, but do so now.

Here is a pdf. link to the lawsuit we received. Daniel Frawley Whistleblower Lawsuit (PDF) - We have not yet been able to contact the firm named as representing Frawley for comment.

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25Mar/121

Update: Details of Frawley v. McMahon “Whistleblower” Lawsuit Just Exposed By Sun Times

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Ernie Souchak, Editor-in-Chief, Illinois PayToPlay

Update:

The Chicago Sun Times has now run the second of what it promises is a three part series concerning a whistleblower lawsuit filed by attorneys representing Daniel T. Frawley.  The Sun Times has yet to provide its readers a copy of that lawsuit.  Is it the same one Illinois Pay-To-Play posted below?  If it is not, it is time for the Sun Times to show its readers the lawsuit on which it’s series is based.  

(Originally posted on Illinois Pay-to-Play  3-25-2012)

In an article dated March 24, 2012, the Chicago Sun Times broke the explosive story of a lawsuit filed July 2011 by Daniel T. Frawley, cooperating federal government mole-informant in Patrick Fitzgerald’s investigation of Tony Rezko, and former Rezko business partner.

According to the Sun Times, the lawsuit charges various members of the McMahon family, associated with McMahon-owned businesses, of fraudulent contracting practices.  The reporters wrote that,

“Frank McMahon’s first cousin, Daniel T. Frawley, filed a “whistleblower” lawsuit in federal court last July accusing McMahon Food, C & C and Krystal of actually being run by men, even though the companies are certified as being women-owned and -operated. As a result, Frawley says McMahon Food was able to obtain multimillion-dollar deals with Cook County government, including supplying dairy goods to the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center.”

Illinois PayToPlay recently received a copy of a “whistleblower” lawsuit attributed to Frawley, by a confidential source, that fits the description of the document exposed by the Sun Times.  Uncertain of its authenticity at the time, we chose not to make it public, but do so now.

Here is a pdf. link to the lawsuit we received. Daniel Frawley Whistleblower Lawsuit (PDF) - We have not yet been able to contact the firm named as representing Frawley for comment.

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1Mar/120

U.S. Attorney Fitzgerald has known of Frawley’s Obama-bribe accusation

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Jontel Kassidy, Senior Capital Correspondent

Since at least last January 22nd, U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald has known of Daniel Frawley’s claim that he gave Tony Rezko $400,000 in cash that Rezko then passed on to U.S. Senator Barack Obama.  We believe, though, that that knowledge goes back much earlier.

In a December 11, 2011 Illinois Pay To Play (IP2P) article entitled “The Fitz Solution to Corruption: The Citizens Report It,” we noted that “While commenting on Blago’s prison sentence, U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald repeated what has become for him a common theme: Illinois citizens are responsible for stopping corruption by reporting it to the authorities.”

Along with that article, IP2P posted a video clip wherein Fitzgerald stated that there needed to “be a change in the public’s attitude. People seem resigned to corruption at times and…they’re afraid to say ‘no’ when someone in power asks them for something they shouldn’t. The people in power should be afraid to ask.”

So it’s a fact that the U.S. Attorney has, on several occasions, encouraged average citizens to get involved in fighting corruption.

Well, we found one citizen who did just that, back on January 22nd – six weeks ago. Here’s the email thread the citizen sent.

From: Address Deleted
To: "Randall Samborn" <Address Deleted@usdoj.gov>, "Kimberly Nerheim" <Adress Deleted@usdoj.gov>
Sent: Tuesday, January 24, 2012 9:15:44 PM
Subject: Public outreach/safety.

Mr Randall Samborn and Ms. Kimberly Nerheim

I am more than a little concerned by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald's complete lack of response to the serious matter that has been brought to his attention below. Mr. Fitzgerald made a very public outreach encouraging people to report corruption to his office. Hopefully he will not disappoint those he urged to risk so much ?

Concerned Citizen

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

_____________________________________________________________________________

From: Address Deleted
To: "Randall Samborn" <Address Deleted@usdoj.gov>
Cc: "Kimberly Nerheim" <Address Deleted@usdoj.gov>
Sent: Sunday, January 22, 2012 4:11:12 PM
Subject: What happens when citizens step up?

Mr. Randall Samborn

U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald has repeatedly challenged the public to do something about corruption in Illinois by bringing information of illegal acts directly to him. Mr. Samborn, while I agree the premise of reporting crime to the U.S. Attorney is a logical step in fighting corruption, I do not underestimate the serious danger those who do are put in.

Need I remind you, it was also Patrick Fitzgerald who acknowledged that his office may be the source for information being leaked to the very criminals he urges the public to inform on. With this in mind, please personally hand a copy of this email to U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald and ask him to personally send me a response addressing concerns I have about his office and my personal safety. At the very least Mr Fitzgerald can acknowledge the risk I am taking exposing corruption at the highest levels.

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Dan Frawley <Address Deleted@gmail.com>
> Date: Tue, 31 May 2011 08:08:15 -0500
> Subject: Frawely vs Weaver
> To: XXXXX XXXXX <XXXXXXXX@gmail.com>
>
> Hi XXXX
> I think the best way to bring this to the public and media is to fact
> plead
> the malpractice case against Weaver.
> I have discussed this with my attorney's and they are willing to do it at
> the right time and way.
> Instead of a news conference being called like the gay guy did with Obama.
> PUT AS THE GUTS OF THE SUIT THE MEETING AT THE FOUR SEASONS AND THE 4OO
> GRAND GOING TO YOU KNOW WHO AND THE USE OF THE MONEY.
> I would bring this out in the for of a legal action not a personal
> vendetta.
> The media with the right reporters would make sure that was national news.
> When the usual denials are made or the old I don't remember I hit him with
> the second naming names dates and places.
> Punches are always more effective when thrown in combination.
> know we figure out the best timing.
> DAN 

 

And in response, what did the citizen hear back from the U.S. Attorney’s office?

Absolute silence.

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11Dec/110

The Fitz Solution to Corruption: The Citizens Report It

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Jontel Kassidy, Senior Capital Correspondent

While commenting on Blago’s prison sentence, U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald repeated what has become for him a common theme: Illinois citizens are responsible for stopping corruption by reporting it to the authorities.

In the longer video of his comments aired by NBC News Chicago, in response to a reporter’s question (1:16 into the clip), Fitz says (beginning at 1:34) that there needs to “…be a change in the public’s attitude. People seem resigned to corruption at times and…they’re afraid to say ‘no’ when someone in power asks them for something they shouldn’t. The people in power should be afraid to ask.”

So, Fitz’s solution is for citizens who are approached to give cash, benefits and favors in exchange for some consideration by corrupt officials, should run and tell the authorities – the federal, state, county and local police, and the various prosecutorial agencies.

That’s The Fitz’s Solution.  It has several weaknesses.

1.  To whom do citizens report corruption when their trust in the authorities is – to be kind – less than complete?

It’s an exaggerated comparison, but what were the consequences to citizens who reported corruption in East Germany to the Stasi? Only if the corruption wasn’t, in some way, sanctioned by the state, were the consequences anything but negative to the citizen.

2.  Much of the corruption in Illinois pay-to-play shakedowns happens at a small business level.  A three-trucks plumbing contractor submits a bid on a public housing project. The sub-contractor is told that a modest political donation to a particular politician would considerably enhance his chances of being awarded the contract. Suppose it’s a federally funded project.

Is the States’ Attorney’s office going to launch an investigation after the Plumbing contractor reports the shakedown? When billions are involved, what resources will be used to address, say, an alleged $3,000 bribe?  Garden variety graft, events that don’t reach the level of the $14 billion that Blago cost the taxpayers of Illinois, is so widespread that there just aren’t enough policing and prosecutorial resources to stem a crime wave like that underway in Illinois.

3. In a culture steeped in corruption like Crook County, kickbacks and greased palms have been going on for so long, so successfully, and with such impunity that Fitz’s suggestion that the authorizes are ready to aggressively prosecute the crooks that citizens report is flat goofy.

The “change of attitude” Fitz’s preaches has to start with the agencies tasked to enforce laws.

To blame the people is to blame the victims.

The Fitz Solution is like saying that the people of Russia are responsible for the corruption of the Putin regime. They voted him in, after all.

That the Jews in 1933 Germany were responsible for the horror the Nazis delivered on them. They should have reported the injustices to the German Courts.

That innocent Mexican civilians are responsible for the violence of the drug traffickers along the border.  After all, the violence couldn’t happen without the victims’ complicity (and, in some cases, that of the U.S. Department of Justice for selling guns to the cartels!).

It’s patently absurd when a high profile “crime fighter” – or the “Exterminator,” as John Kass calls him – blames the victims.

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21Nov/110

The Sun Times Asks “How much time will Tony Rezko serve?”

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Hugo Floriani, Investigative Reporter

Natasha Korecki, Federal Courts Reporter for the Sun Times, asked that question in a recent article.

Tony is scheduled, once again, to be sentenced Tuesday, November 22, in federal court. We’re holding our collective breath.

The rest of Natasha’s piece is designed to prepare us for a sentence of “time served.”  Here’s what we’re told:

  • The U.S. Attorney, Patrick “Elliott Ness” Fitzgerald, wants Tony to serve 11-15 years for failing to cooperate. (That’s because Patrick’s what John Kass of the Tribune calls, the Exterminator of criminals.)
  • Tony’s lawyer says that Tony’s “talks with the government” help encourage others, like Lon Monk, to testify against Blago.
  • A defense attorney says that the judge could credit Tony for his cooperation (What cooperation?) even though he wasn’t called to testify against Blago.
  • The judge doesn’t have to follow the prosecution’s sentencing recommendation. (Oh, oh. Brace for impact.)
  • Meanwhile, “Rezko served about nine months in the most restrictive jail conditions at the downtown Metropolitan Correctional Center — a Special Housing Unit called the ‘SHU,’ where ‘high-risk’ inmates, including accused terrorists and currently a suspected high-ranking leader of a violent Mexican drug cartel, are held. High-profile defendants or those cooperating with prosecutors are also held there.”  (So now the Sun Times knows where Tony’s been. Who leaked this time? Chase again?)
  • Unidentified “legal observers” say the judge could credit Tony for having done jail time in harsh conditions. (Are you feeling set-up yet?)
  • A former Chief of Staff of former Governor, now inmate, George Ryan says that the SHU “should not be shrugged off.”  (Are you feeling Tony’s pain yet?)
  • Tony also spent time in a Wisconsin county jail (Really?) “…where he cannot go outdoors and has not had any physical contact with family.”  (OMG, such an ordeal for poor Tony!)

This article reads like the storyline for a sequel to A Christmas Carol with Tony playing a grown-up Tiny Tim.  Patrick Fitzgerald is the legalistic Scrooge. The kindly Judge St. Eve releases Tony from the clutches of debtor’ prison and he limps into the sunset – a free man.

Sort of like…John Thomas. Another faux witness to corruption in Crook County, never called to testify.

Get ready for time served. Unless there’s another sentencing postponement. And what a shock that’d be!

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6Nov/110

Rezko’s Sentencing Recommendations, Who’s Zoomin’ Who?

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Thomas Barton, Illinois Pay-to-Play Political Commentator

The Jimmy Hoffa of federal prisoners may be getting ready to finally surface, in the flesh. Talk of Tony Rezko’s imminent sentencing is building. Suppose that means anything, this time?

After 3½ years of self-imposed incarceration, somewhere on the planet, he’s about to surface, according to the Chicago Tribune.  According to another source, Tony “has spent much of his more than 3½ years in jail in solitary, rarely getting fresh air and subject to a diet that has resulted in him losing 80 pounds, according to a defense filing unsealed Thursday.”  Poor Tony.  He’s been Steve McQueen in the 1973 movie Papillon.

Paa-leese.  We’re supposed to believe that Tony has been doing hard time at the…well, where has he been all this hard time? On a military base in Wisconsin playing golf in a light disguise four times a week?  Indoor tennis on rainy days? And where is he now? When will those relentless investigative reporters at the Chicago Tribune and Sun Times be able to ask him their piercing interrogatives?

Tony’s attorneys want him sentences to time served. (Where was that again?)

Patrick Fitzgerald’s office wants him sentenced to from 11-15 years because – get ready for this – he failed to cooperate with prosecutors.  That’s why, we’re to believe, Tony wasn’t called as a witness in the Blago trial. After 3½ years, the U.S. Attorney finally decided that Tony hasn’t cooperated. Geeze, Louise. Buying that requires…a willing suspension of disbelief. (The Tribune’s John Kass will buy it, though. For him, Fitzgerald is the Great Exterminator.)

Sentencing by U.S. Judge Amy St. Eve is set, yet again, for Nov. 22.  Waiting for St. Eve to sentence Tony is like waiting for Gogot. Birthdays pass while waiting. Wanna bet it’ll be postponed again?

But what if it isn’t postponed? Will her Honor throw the book at Tony? Or, sentence him to time served.  Or, maybe 4 months in a federal pen where, for the 3 months he has to put in, he can work on his backhand tennis return.

The best way to watch all this is to pull up an easy chair, get a bag of popcorn and enjoy the show. Cause it’s all theatre, folks.  Tony’s friend Obama is going to pardon him eventually anyway.  After all the money Tony passed his way, Tony deserves some executive clemency. Tony’s mentioned he expects a pardon to two former associates.

Aretha Franklin asked the relevant question about all this…

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16Oct/110

Patrick Fitzgerald: Intrepid Crime Fighter? Or, Politically-Driven Leaker? Series Summary (Part 10)

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Hugo Floriani, Investigative Reporter

The first sentence in Part 1 of this series asked this:

“Is the United States Attorney for the Northeastern District of Illinois an intrepid crime fighter, as he’s typically portrayed by most of the Chicago and national media? Or, is the legend of a modern day Untouchable Elliott Ness largely a media-created myth?”

What followed made a case that the Untouchable image of U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald is largely a myth.

As to circumstantial evidence:

“It means that existence of principal facts is only inferred from circumstances. Twin City Fire Ins. Co. v. Lonas, 225 Ky. 717, 75 S W.2d 348, 350. 

When the existence of the principal fact is deduced from evidentiary by a process of probably reasoning, the evidence and proof as said to be presumptive. Best, Pres. 246; Id. 12. All presumptive evidence is circumstantial because necessarily derived from or made up of circumstances, but all circumstantial evidence is not presumptive. Burrill.

The proof of various facts or circumstances which usually attend the main fact in dispute, and therefore tend to prove its existence, or to sustain, by their consistency, the hypothesis claimed.  Or as otherwise defined, it consists in reasoning from facts which are known or proved to establish such as are conjectured to exist.”  (p. 309, Black’s Law Dictionary, Fourth Edition)

So, what are the facts and circumstances that we know that collectively tend to prove, or sustain by their consistency, the existence of the hypothesis that Patrick Fitzgerald is a politically-driven, not jurisprudence-driven, prosecutor whose image as an intrepid, unbiased crime fighter is a media-created fabrication?

Here are a few headlines from Parts 1-9:

Fitzgerald acknowledged that someone leaked information to the Chicago Tribune, via a reporter for the Chicago Tribune, while the reporter, John Chase, sat mute in the front row of the news conference where the arrest of Blago was described as an effort to stop a crime spree. (Chase has told a source known to this writer that he would not identify who leaked him the information on First Amendment grounds.)

In fact, (1) Blago’s crime spree had, with Fitzgerald’s knowledge, been going on for several years.  (2) Chase has not been called to account for tipping off Blago that his conversations were being recorded by the feds. (3) Eric Holder’s Department of Selective Justice has taken no steps – like that taken by Fitzgerald when he jailed Judith Miller of the New York Times in the Valerie Plame Case – to force Chase to reveal the source of the leak. And, (4) Fitz’s demeanor in discussing the leak in a press conference can be accurately described as disinterested. 

The urgency to arrest Blago was manufactured out of whole cloth. The leak had to originate out of the DoJ. And, the closest outlet for the DoJ to the Chicago Tribune is Fitzgerald’s office. You connect the dots.

In retrospect, we know now that Richard Armitage was the confessed leaker in the Valerie Plame Case.  We also know that Fitzgerald knew of Armitage’s confession before undertaking a long and costly investigation that convicted a key staff member of Vice President Cheney of a crime not connected to the Plame leak. And, that this media event, upon which the foundation of the Untouchable myth was built by the main stream media, was politically-driven. 

The Plame “investigation” boiled down to a surrogate WWF-like wrestling match between two Big Beltway Boys: Armitage representing Powell – Libby for Cheney. With Fitzgerald as the biased referee.  And, it will be so chronicled by unbiased historians in the future.

The arrest of Blago was timed, not to stop a crime spree, or the selling of a Senate seat – since the latter notion is built on the myth that, once Blago got paid for appointing someone, the act was immediate and irrevocable.  The arrest was timed to save Congressmen Jesse Jackson, Jr., from criminal prosecution for bribing a governor in order to receive a Senate appointment. Connect the dots. It was about saving J.J., Junior.

The Mole was planted by the DoJ to contribute to building a case against Tony Rezko in order to (a) help scuttle Blago – who has his own self-destructive gene – and, (b)protect the image of Barack Obama as a Chicago politician untarnished by association with the likes of a Tony Rezko. 

Getting Tony out of the way was necessary to hiding his relationship to Barack. And, keeping him sequestered at an undisclosed location was necessary to remove him from access to the media. But perhaps even more importantly, Rezko was never called as a witness in either Blago trial, yet he was among Dead Meat’s leading extortionists.  All part of concealing Barack Obama’s involvement in Illinois Play to Play. 

By its general passivity, the Chicago media have been complicit in hiding of Rezko. After all, Obama was their guy, too.

In the end, Tony will be sentenced to time voluntarily served – wherever that was – and eventually be pardoned by his longtime friend and financial benefactor, Barack.  (Remember, Eric Holder facilitated the pardoning of Marc Rich.)

The Mole was a big winner in all this. He never appeared in court to testify against Rezko, since his appearance might have led to testimony as to Rezko’s long financial support of the young Illinois, and then U.S., Senator. The Mole is on record as having witnessed the two together in a much closer relationship than Obama has ever admitted.  For his work, the Mole made out like a bandit. New name. New career. New wealth. In a New Town.

In a second Obama administration, Fitzgerald will be rewarded by being appointed the next FBI Director. Or, maybe even soon, he’ll get Holder’s job, if Eric’s connections to Fast & Furious sink him.

This is a circumstantial case.  But remember Fitz’s words:  “I think people need to understand we won't be afraid to take strong circumstantial cases into court." 

To conclude: Three public entities head the list of those responsible for putting Barack Obama in the White House.

  1. The Chicago Tribune, the Sun Times, and the entire Chicago TV media,, for selectively withholding information concerning Obama’s past in Chicago.
  2. Former Tribune political reporter and consultant to Blago during his Congressional campaigns – David Axelrod.  And, the…
  3. U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, Patrick J. Fitzgerald.

This story is far from over.

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