Levine says he was amazed at Rezko clout
Levine: Rezko could 'get anything done'
In decades in politics, former Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board member Stuart Levine had never met an operator as powerful as Tony Rezko, Levine said this morning, in his third day of testimony in Rezko’s corruption trial.
During a 2004 telephone conversation that was secretly recorded by the FBI, Levine told a co-conspirator: “I’m telling you that I have never been in a better position than I’m in right now. Part of the reason is there’s never been such tight control of the central apparatus. This guy is making decisions [and] can get anything done that he wants done.”
(AP/Sun-Times files)
After playing that recording for the jury, prosecutors asked Levine what he meant by those comments, made to construction magnate Jacob Kiferbaum, who was in on some of the alleged fraud schemes Levine had been orchestrating with Rezko.
The “central apparatus,” Levine testified, was Gov. Blagojevich’s office. And the guy who was “making decisions,” according to Levine, was Rezko.
“Although I had been involved in politics and in corrupt political deals before,” Levine said, “I had never witnessed . . . someone who was able to influence the governor as I saw that Mr. Rezko could. And I had never been as close to an individual who had that type of power.”
Earlier in the day, Levine testified that he and Rezko agreed to split a $1 million to $1.5 million bribe from Kiferbaum. The bribe was to be paid in exchange for Rezko and Levine using their influence to help a Wisconsin company, which hired Kiferbaum as its contractor, win state approval to build a new hospital in Crystal Lake.
Levine and Rezko allegedly engineered the hospital being approved, but the facility was never built after details about the criminal case against Levine, Kiferbaum and Rezko began to come to light. Levine and Kiferbaum both have pleaded guilty in the case and are cooperating against Rezko, a former top Blagojevich fund-raiser. Blagojevich has denied wrongoing and is not facing any criminal charges.
“Stuart Levine’s assertions about the governor are wrong,” Blagojevich spokeswoman Abby Ottenhoff said. “As we’ve said before, that’s not how the governor does business.”rr Levine will be back on the witness stand this afternoon.