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Final Smith hearing is July 19th

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The Illinois House Select Committee on Discipline will have its final hearing on possible punishment for indicted state Rep. Derrick Smith on July 19, according to a schedule posted Friday.

Much of the committee’s business – which is not a court proceeding but has the tone of one – between now and then will occur by email, the schedule indicates, but the committee chair, Rep. Barbara Flynn Currie, can call additional hearings as needed.

The committee and Smith are to disclose to each other by July 6 all evidence they intend to introduce at the final hearing. By July 13 each side can object to the other’s evidence. By July 16, each side must respond to the objections raised by the opposing party.

The chairwoman may rule on the objections in a written order or may issue her rulings at the final hearing, which will occur in Chicago.

Members of the Select Committee on Discipline, a bipartisan body charged with deliberating possible professional punishment for Smith, want to move forward as quickly as possible, they said at their first hearing Wednesday.

However, Smith’s attorney, Victor Henderson, said the committee should hold off because Smith’s case still is pending in federal court, and he still is receiving discovery information from federal prosecutors about their evidence.

Let’s just get this over with.

* My weekly syndicated newspaper column is about this same subject…

In stark contrast to the glacially paced House Committee on Investigations, the panel charged with deciding indicted state Rep. Derrick Smith’s punishment looks like it will move forward with much more speed.

The investigations committee took two months to decide that there was enough evidence against Smith (D-Chicago) to warrant punishment. Smith was indicted for allegedly accepting $7,000 in cash bribes just before the March primary election. It was June before that committee took final action.

The two House leaders then appointed members to the Select Committee on Discipline, and that committee’s first meeting was last week. Smith’s attorney, Victor Henderson, strongly objected to the committee hearing evidence within a few days, claiming it was just too soon.

Henderson also complained that a federal judge has required him to first obtain permission before he can use any evidence to defend Smith before the committee. And Henderson said no rush to judgment should take place before the Nov. 6 election.

But the two House managers, who essentially are acting as prosecutors in the proceedings, dismissed Henderson’s concerns by pointing out that this was an internal House matter and not a court of law. There’s a big difference between the evidence required to kick a member out of the chamber and that required to convict a citizen and put him behind bars.

The House will have to reconvene to uphold any decision by the discipline committee. That return date can’t be set until the committee makes its final decision, which by the looks of things might not be that long from now.

Besides having Smith in their midst as a constant reminder to the public about Illinois’ ongoing corruption problems, House Democrats face the serious public relations problem of Smith refusing to withdraw from the general election.

But the Democrats got some good news last week when Lance Tyson said he had gathered more than 7,500 signatures to run as a third-party candidate in Smith’s 10th House District. He needed just 1,500 petition signatures, so he did quite well.

Tyson was picked to run against Smith as a third-party candidate by Democratic ward committeemen. He will run on the 10th District Unity Party ticket.

Tyson couldn’t run as an independent because a new state law prohibits that in light of Tyson voting as Democrat in the March primary.

And the Democrats believe they may be able to kick the Republican candidate off the ballot in the 10th District. They contend that Kimberly Small does not have enough petition signatures to qualify, and they’ve filed two different objections to her candidacy.

Small, who is white and running in a predominantly black district, was described as a “moderate” by local Republicans when she was appointed.

Small, who sells jets for a living, later drew some controversy when the Chicago Sun-Times reported that she had made some off-color jokes about President Barack Obama and his wife on her Facebook page.

Also in the 10th District, Joseph R. Sneed, a real estate broker and city worker, is running as an independent.

Tyson has not yet disclosed any large campaign contributions. Smith finally filed an amended campaign finance report for the first three months of the year. He did not disclose any campaign spending at all when he initially filed his finance report in April.

That was ridiculous and unbelievable because he obviously spent quite a bit of money on his campaign. Smith finally disclosed last month that he had spent about $58,000 during the first quarter and had almost $46,000 in the bank as of the end of March.

Smith also reported three in-kind contributions in June from House Speaker Michael Madigan’s Democratic Majority fund. The contributions apparently were made during the primary but were not disclosed until now.

posted by Rich Miller
Monday, Jul 2, 12 @ 12:51 pm

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