* Roy Hofer, the president of the Chicago Bar Association from 1988 to 1989, rips into Senate President John Cullerton’s recent Tribune op-ed with his own Tribune op-ed. I’m excerpting this part for a reason…
With respect to the investigation and enforcement of public corruption, the General Assembly refused to adopt the crux of the comprehensive changes proposed by the commission: adding significant additional corruption offenses to the books and providing additional tools to law enforcement officials to uncover and prosecute wrongdoers.
This comes as no surprise, as our lawmakers have been reluctant to adopt legislation that makes them accountable for their unethical conduct. Instead, they passed legislation that imposes additional penalties on those who are caught. That’s a good idea, but why not also make it easier to catch the crooks?
Former reform commission chairman Patrick Collins also criticized Cullerton on this very same topic in his recent Tribune op-ed…
Why do we have a wiretap law that covers many serious crimes, but not corruption by public officials? Most states have a law similar to what the commission proposed. Why are we carving out the politicians’ crimes — sparing them from full investigations?
* Here is what the Tribune printed of Cullerton’s opinion piece…
Yes, we did reject the commission’s enforcement ideas for state prosecutors. We believe that authorizing “warrantless wiretaps” is a bad idea, ripe for abuse and wholly inconsistent with the Illinois Constitution. Instead, we passed two real game-changing laws. One forces politicians convicted of bribery, taking kickbacks or extortion to forfeit all campaign contributions and any proceeds they got from their criminal activity. The other bars politicians convicted of official misconduct or a similar federal crime from deriving a financial benefit from their misconduct.
But Cullerton told me the other day that the Tribune had omitted a key sentence from his original draft. I asked for a copy. The deleted part is highlighted…
Yes, we did reject the commission’s enforcement ideas for state prosecutors. We believe that authorizing “warrantless wiretaps” is a bad idea, ripe for abuse and wholly inconsistent with the Illinois Constitution. Former prosecutors, sitting judges, and the Illinois State Bar Association shared that view and strongly opposed even the Commission’s own watered-down enforcement ideas as unnecessary and duplicative.
That disappeared sentence sure appears to buttress Cullerton’s case, and more completely addresses both Hofer’s and Collins’ questions. Too bad it was deleted.
The complete, unedited Cullerton op-ed can be read by clicking here.
And, by the way, when I published an op-ed by Collins, I only made a couple of minor changes after consulting him.
* Related…
* Pantagraph: Veto HB 7; Illinois needs real reforms
* Sen. Roland Burris failed to reveal he has options to buy stock in a company where he was a board member, records show: Burris can buy the stock at prices ranging from $9 a share to about $20 a share, according to Inland’s federal securities filings. The senator is unlikely to exercise those options any time soon — Inland stock closed at $6.72 on Wednesday, below Burris’ $9 option.