* For good reason, I know a lot of you probably despise Scott Fawell. But Fox Chicago interviewed him last night and he made a couple of interesting points about Chris Kelly’s death. Go watch the whole thing, but here’s the relevant excerpt…

LEAD-IN: Fawell accepts responsibility for his crimes, but [Fawell says Kelly’s three indictments show that] federal prosecutors stop at nothing to compel you to cooperate with their investigation.

FAWELL: “I think there are some issues that are brought up in this [Kelly suicide] that ought to be addressed by the public… When is enough enough?… Is that what the government’s role is is to just never take ‘No’ for an answer and beat you into submission until a guy commits, takes his own life? That’s pretty severe.”

Q: But on the flip-side, should the prosecution be going soft on suspected white-collar criminals?

FAWELL: “No. I don’t say that at all. I think when they indicted me - I got 52 months in prison. That’s a long time… I don’t think that’s going soft on them.”

Keep in mind that Chris Kelly was indicted twice after he pled guilty to the first federal charge this past January. He pled guilty to the second charge last week and was due to report to prison this Friday. He was scheduled to go on trial with Rod Blagojevich and several others next summer.

* The Question: Do you think federal prosecutors went too far with their pursuit of Chris Kelly? As always, fully explain your answer, please.