.."oooohh, can I go to prison if he don't want to go
Posted on 04/17/2006 12:14:10 PM PDT by freepatriot32
CHICAGO - 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.
Ryan, 72, sat stone-faced as the verdict was read and afterward vowed to appeal.
"I believe this decision today is not in accordance with the kind of public service that I provided to the people of Illinois over 40 years, and needless to say I am disappointed in the outcome," the former governor said.
Ryan faces up to 20 years in prison for racketeering conspiracy charge alone, the most serious against him in the 22-count indictment. The jury found him guilty of all counts, including fraud, obstructing the Internal Revenue Service and lying to the FBI.
Co-defendant Larry Warner, a Chicago businessman and Ryan friend, was found guilty of racketeering conspiracy, mail fraud, attempted extortion, illegally structuring bank withdrawals and money laundering.
Neither man took the stand during their six-month trial.
Prosecutors accused Ryan 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 that help, Ryan 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, 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.
The case against Ryan and Warner was the state's biggest political corruption trial in decades, and it had it share of troubles.
In late March, months of testimony nearly went down the drain when the judge discovered two jurors had failed to mention past arrests on their court questionnaires. Rather than declare a mistrial, U.S. District Judge Rebecca R. Pallmeyer decided to replace the two jurors with alternates and, over the objection of Ryan's attorneys, ordered the jury to start deliberations over.
The new jury had deliberated for 10 days when it announced its verdict Monday.
Afterward, Ryan attorney Dan K. Webb, a former federal prosecutor, zeroed in on the judge's decision to replace the jurors.
"We're going to begin working immediately on post-trial motions to try to get this verdict overturned," Webb said.
During the trial, Webb had pounded on a theme that no one ever testified to seeing Ryan take a payoff. His powerful law firm, Winston & Strawn, represented Ryan for free _ at an estimated cost of $10 million.
Ryan's sentencing was set for Aug. 4.
The corruption scandal that led to Ryan's downfall began over a decade ago with a much smaller focus: a federal investigation into a fiery van crash in Wisconsin that killed six children.
The deadly 1994 crash exposed a scheme inside the Illinois secretary of state's office in which unqualified truck drivers obtained licenses for bribes. Ryan was secretary of state at the time, and prosecutors would later argue that thousands of dollars in payoff money from the licenses went into a Ryan campaign fund.
The probe expanded over the next eight years into a wide-ranging corruption investigation that eventually reached Ryan in the governor's office.
Seventy-nine former state officials, lobbyists, truck drivers and others have been since charged. Before Ryan's trial, 74 had been convicted, including Ryan's longtime top aide, Scott Fawell.
Fawell was a star witness against Ryan and the author of a 1994 memo that prosecutor Patrick Collins called "the Magna Carta" of the racketeering scheme.
The memo urged Ryan, then-secretary of state, to replace inspector general Dean Bauer with someone who "won't ask about FR tickets" _ political fundraising tickets. Bauer himself pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice and acknowledged the government could prove he had spent seven years covering up scandals to spare Ryan personal and political embarrassment.
Even as he faced federal charges back home, Ryan accepted speaking invitations across the country and was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for his criticism of the death penalty.
In 2000, the Republican governor declared a moratorium on executions in Illinois after 13 death row inmates were found to have been wrongly convicted. Then, days before he left office in 2003, he cleared death row, commuting the sentences of all 167 inmates to life in prison. He declared that the state's criminal justice system was "haunted by the demon of error."
The auto accident that set the case in motion killed six children of the Rev. Scott and Janet Willis. A trucking company official later said he believed the truck driver's license was one of several bought from a state official.
The Willises, who received a $100 million settlement, attended parts of Ryan's trial.
.."oooohh, can I go to prison if he don't want to go
I remember when Lyin' Ryan was running against Glenn Poshard for governer. Poshard was an old fashioned prolife Democrat (don't remember them?) but he was from downstate.
Ryan got tons of the liberal single-issue Democrats to vote for him, even though everyone knew he was disgusting, dishonest, and corrupt, just because he was thoroughly proabortion. Gawd, I wish the whole RoevWade thing never happened.
This was the same cycle that Al Salvi ran. The libs hated him because he was progun, but after election he turned into a gun grabber. He's now respected for his growth.
This won't affect Illinois at all. When Chicago alderman Larry Bloom, the moral conscience of the Dems, went to the big house, no one even noticed or cared. Who remembers or cares about Otto Kerner (of the Kerner Commission) or Dan Walker?
dangit what did I miss last night? I saw the last half, not the first (Sopranos)
I think we should also give credit where credit is due to the US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald who is putting a lot of these crooked Illinois politicians in jail
Sir, your arrogant demeanor isn't going to do you any favors on this one for now YOU are not making the decisions.
That's right. Without Fitzgerald, or someone like him, none of this would have happened. Guaranteed.
How's that for a politician's view of life? "heck, I commuted all those death sentences and all you postal workers on the jury STILL convicted me?!?!
It's the forty years of public service that positioned him for this corruption!
These politicians never cease to amaze me.
"I believe this decision today is not in accordance with the kind of public service that I provided to the people of Illinois over 40 years
This verdict greatly pleases me as he will now be sent to the place in which he tried to send honest people.
Fitzgerald botched up the Libby case mate. Knowing that Joe Wilson and Plame were drunk and telling their neighbors at Parties she was an agent, negates Fitz' case. Why did he bother with an indictment? Wilson is a hack.
He richly deserves this verdict. It's not going to help us much with the "culture of corruption" mantra that the Dems have been singing, though.
True, they're focusing more on a national level, but all this noise gets absorbed by those who don't follow politics as closely as we do.
As most lifer politicians, he toted an attitude of exemption from prosecution as proved by his arrogant statement referencing his 40 years of service.
I wonder if he is toting a bullet proof vest yet?
Ryan deserves all he gets. I jusy wish more of these crroks were prosecuted & did time.
You missed one half hour of homo advocacy, and an anti-bush tirade.
This scum-bag was the last straw that broke the ILL GOP. I hope he rots. He is the ONLY Republican I refused to vote for in my life.
In Illinois we live in a Kleptocracy. There isn't a lick of difference between the Democrats and the Republicans except that the Democrats can actually win an election once in a while.
Are there any honest politicians in Chicago?
Edwin Edwards, the 4 term RAT Governor of Louisiana is currently serving time in a Fed Prison in Fort Worth.
Wow flaglady. Couldn't have said it any better! KUDOS. Illinois republican politics is a VERY bad joke and all of us having to live in this place will have to suffer for it some more.
That is exactly why he did that.
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