Rezko trial: Finally, the real indictment
After two years, the real Tony Rezko indictment -- without all the cloak and dagger of "Individual I" or "Firm A" references -- is made public.
In a pretty unusual move, prosecutors kept secret the individuals represented in the indictment right up through Rezko's corruption trial.
All of the allegations came out in court, so this isn't anything new. But this is the first time prosecutors put it in black and white for all the public to see. The Sun-Times before the trial did its own ABCs of the government proffer, because that too was written in code.
Here's the real indictment:
Rezko indictment
Comments
Why didn't the matter of those twelve public housing developments located in Illinois State Senator Obama's senatorial district ever come up in the Rezko trial? Obviously the millions of Federal, State, and Local government funds that wound up in Rezko's pockets could have been as easilly traceable as Rezko's telephone logs. Likewise the degree of fraud that was involved in the public housing scam could be very well-substantiated by the hundreds of "poor folks" who froze their butts off during those memorably cold winters, and had no water running in their apartments, while Rezko was throwing political fundraisers in his mansion in Winnetka, and Obama was looking to purchase a $1.5 million dollar home in Hyde Park. Chicago Alderman could have even be subpeoned to tell how it was that they "fined" Rezko a measely couple of hundred bucks for those horrendous building violations, and why Obama wrote a letter to a bank on Rezko's behalf. It could have been an interesting case. Too bad it didn't materialize.
Posted by: P.J.Dalton | May 16, 2008 09:54 AM