Daily Chronicle / Daily-Chronicle.com • Thursday, April 14, 2016
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STATE
Judge suggests he’ll factor in Hastert lies for sentencing By MICHAEL TARM
only adult on the trip, touched him inappropriately after suggesting he would massage a groin injury the boy had, prosecutors said. Defense attorneys called details of Individual A’s account of Hastert’s behavior “ambiguous.” “We are not so certain that the incident qualifies as sexual misconduct, especially for a coach and trainer 42 years ago,” they said in the filing, unsealed Wednesday. Prosecutors said there is no doubt.
Hastert “used his position of trust as a teacher and coach to touch a child’s genitals and then undress and ask the child for a back massage in a hotel room,” they said in a Friday filing. “There is no ambiguity; defendant sexually abused Individual A.” Judge Thomas M. Durkin indicated several times Wednesday that he was disturbed by Hastert’s claims to agents in 2015 that Individual A was extorting him. Hastert was accusing someone he victimized of “holding him
up,” Durkin said. Those lies, unlike the abuse allegations, were not distant history, the judge said. “That’s not conduct that’s 40 years old,” Durkin said. “That conduct is ... a year old.” About how Hastert’s false allegations against Individual A might affect his sentencing calculations, the judge added: “Among the aggravating factors in this case, that’s a big one.” Among other assertions in the 14page defense filing: • Individual A still could sue Hastert if he’s not paid the portion of the $3.5 million he hasn’t received – $1.8 million, plus interest. • The probation office was wrong to speculate in a sealed report that Hastert could have abused others after getting into politics. “Similarly, there is no basis for the conjecture that Mr. Hastert engaged in any sexual misconduct overseas,” it says. • When FBI agents first came to speak to Hastert unannounced in December 2014, they wore wires to secretly record his answers. Prosecutors say agents initially had no inkling sexual abuse was behind the payments Hastert made to Individual A. When Hastert said Individual A was extorting him, agents even helped stage and record phone conversations with the former wrestler. It all backfired on Hastert, whose political career had taken him to speaker, second in the line of presidential succession.
16 times in 2014 was charged with murder about a year later, after a judge ordered that the squad-car video be made public.
Lake and Porter counties. Niemeyer said the eminent domain laws need to be updated to prevent a railroad from using them for such a long corridor.
of Sanguinetti’s term. The question will go to voters if three-fifths of each chamber supports the proposal. An identical measure is pending in the Senate.
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The Associated Press
CHICAGO – Dennis Hastert’s lawyers have suggested that what occurred with a 14-year-old in a motel decades ago might not qualify as sexual abuse, while the judge in the former U.S. House speaker’s hush-money case signaled Wednesday that he’ll factor in Hastert’s lies to investigators when he determines a sentence. Federal prosecutors said at a hearing Wednesday in Chicago that someone identified as “Individual D” – one of at least four boys who prosecutors say Hastert sexually abused in the 1970s – would be one of two witnesses seeking to speak at the April 27 sentencing. The other is a sister of a now-deceased accuser. The 14-year-old, referred to as “Individual A” in court papers, is at the core of the case. Hastert pleaded guilty last fall to breaking banking laws as he sought to pay $3.5 million to the man not to divulge his misconduct when he taught and coached wrestling from 1965 to 1981 in Yorkville, a Chicago suburb. After first saying he withdrew large sums because he didn’t trust banks, Hastert told investigators he was the target of a bogus sexual abuse claim. Individual A told prosecutors Hastert abused him in the late 1970s in a motel room on the way home from wrestling camp. He said Hastert, the
ILLINOIS ROUNDUP
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News from across the state Chicago police task force talks wide range of reforms
CHICAGO – A task force that reviewed Chicago police practices in the wake of several police shootings of young black men has issued recommendations for sweeping changes, including hiring an inspector general and overhauling union contracts. The panel, established by Mayor Rahm Emanuel, said the department must acknowledge decades of entrenched racism within its ranks. A report released Wednesday called the videotaped killing of Laquan McDonald a “tipping point” in the department’s need for reform. The white officer who shot the black teenager shot
AP file photo
Former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert is seen leaving the federal courthouse in Chicago on Oct. 28, 2015, after a hearing in his hush-money case.
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Proposed rail line skirting Chicago draws opposition
LOWELL, Ind. – Hundreds of people voiced concern at public forums about the impact on local communities of a proposed $8 billion, 278-mile rail line from Indiana to Wisconsin aimed at relieving Chicago-area freight congestion. “It would annihilate home values, and it would kill us,” Lake County Commissioner Gerry Scheub said at a forum being held Tuesday by the U.S. Surface Transportation Board in Lowell, 30 miles south of Gary, Indiana. He suggested a route farther south would be better. Other Lake County officials and state Sen. Rick Niemeyer also spoke out against the proposal by Great Lakes Basin Transportation to build a rail line that could handle 110 trains a day through southern
Bill to abolish lieutenant governor office advances
SPRINGFIELD – A measure to eliminate the office of lieutenant governor in Illinois has gotten initial approval in the state House. The bill from Republican state Rep. David McSweeney would not apply to the state’s current lieutenant governor, Evelyn Sanguinetti. The House State Government Administration Committee unanimously approved the bill Wednesday, 12-0. McSweeney said the office has limited responsibilities and eliminating the position would save the state about $1.6 million annually. The change would be a constitutional amendment so voters would ultimately decide whether to eliminate the office starting in 2019, the end
House OKs suspending late vehicle plate fines
SPRINGFIELD – The Illinois House has passed a measure to suspend fines for drivers who are late renewing their vehicle license plates until the state can continue mailing reminders. The bill advanced out of the Illinois House unanimously Tuesday and now goes to the Illinois Senate for consideration. The secretary of state stopped mailing renewal reminders to save money while Illinois operates without a budget. The state has collected more than $5 million in fines since the beginning of the year. That’s more than double than the amount collected during the first three months of 2015.
– Wire reports