Prosecutors: Rezko sought cash to avoid lien on gov's home
Tony Rezko asked an official in Gov. Blagojevich’s administration to pay him $25,000 so Rezko could use the money to keep construction contractors from putting a lien on the governor’s home, federal prosecutors said in court today.
Prosecutors got a judge’s OK for Ali Ata — former executive director of the Illinois Finance Authority — to be allowed to tell jurors in Rezko’s corruption trial about the cash payments.
(Rich Hein/Al Podgorski/Sun-Times)
Rezko told Ata “this is going to be embarrassing to him [Blagojevich]” if the contractors put a lien on Blagojevich’s Ravenswood Manor home, Assistant U.S. Attorney Carrie Hamilton told U.S. District Judge Amy J. St. Eve.
Rezko’s defense team was seeking to limit what Ata can tell jurors about Rezko, who is accused of manipulating votes on state boards to enrich himself, associates and the governor’s campaign fund.
“Ata claims that he gave or lent cash to Rezko on four or five occasions . . . and estimates the total cash disbursements amounted to $125,000,” Rezko’s lawyers wrote. “Ata alternatively stated he did not know what the cash was for, then proceeds to say he supplied $25,000 in cash to pay certain contractors who were threatening to put a lien on another individual’s [Blagojevich’s] home.
“Ata recounted these alleged cash transactions in a suspiciously dramatic way, including meetings on ‘narrow streets’ in Chicago with ‘black plastic bags’ of cash.”
St. Eve ruled that Ata will be allowed to testify about the cash transactions — but not to tell jurors details about narrow streets and bags of cash. Ata is expected to testify Thursday.
“We can’t comment on alleged conversations that the governor was not a party to,” Blagojevich spokeswoman Abby Ottenhoff said today.
The Chicago Sun-Times reported in February 2007 that Blagojevich and his wife, Patti, hired a Rezko company — Chicago Construction Services — to oversee the upgrading of their Northwest Side bungalow.
At the time, the Blagojeviches said they spent $79,922 to contractors working on the project, which included family-room renovations and a new deck. On top of that amount, they said they paid Chicago Construction Services $17,768.
“As we said last year, the Blagojeviches personally paid for the work to renovate their 14-by-20 family room out of their checking account,” Ottenhoff said.
Chicago Construction Services began overseeing the Blagojevich work in July 2003, after Rezko began pushing the governor to place friends and associates in key state posts. The project took place during a 16-month period in which Patti Blagojevich, a real estate broker, netted about $86,000 from Rezko-orchestrated real estate deals.
No lien ever was filed on the governor’s home.
In court today, Rezko’s lawyers argued that the cash transfers and the allegations regarding the Blagojevich house aren’t relevant to Rezko’s case. Joseph Duffy said that prosecutors — who added Ata as a witness only last week — are “putting on a witness on the 11th hour, spouting these allegations with nothing to support it.”
“There is absolutely no documentation to support Ata’s claims, and any testimony on this topic has no relevance to the case,” wrote Mariah E. Moran, one of Rezko’s lawyers. “Ata cannot even state whether he treated the payments as loans or gifts, and there is no indication that the payments, even were they made as described by Ata, were illegal or were in any way related to any transaction relevant to this case.
“In particular, Ata’s belief that he gave cash to pay contractors who worked on the governor’s house has no relevance to the charged offenses and was not disclosed.”
Hamilton told the judge that Rezko also asked Ata for another $50,000 in cash, saying it was intended for fellow Blagojevich fund-raiser Chris Kelly. Rezko and Ata drove together to Kelly’s house with the cash in the car, the prosecutor said.
Ata said he didn’t actually see the cash change hands and didn’t know what the money was for.
Hamilton said the prosecution is trying, with Ata’s testimony, to show that “these two” — Rezko and Kelly — “are, in fact, in this together, and they share in things together.”
Ata also told prosecutors that, after he received a grand jury subpoena in late 2005, two people contacted him — he believed on Rezko’s behalf — in an effort to stop him from cooperating. Hamilton said one of those people was the late Orlando Jones, a Rezko business associate and former top Cook County government official.
Duffy questioned Ata’s proposed testimony. “We don’t believe any of these transactions ever took place,” Duffy said.