– Prosecutors are pointing out former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert’s “stunning hypocrisy” for representing himself as a child-safety advocate despite having engaged in sexual misconduct with a minor.
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Also on Wednesday, a judge ordered that the defense’s response to the government’s pre-sentence report, which detailed the allegations against Hastert, be unsealed.
Prosecutor Steven Block told Judge Thomas M. Durkin in court Wednesday that he expects someone identified in court papers as “Individual D” to make a statement at the sentencing April 27. After first telling the Federal Bureau of Investigation he withdrew large sums of money because he didn’t trust banks, Hastert later told investigators he was the target of a bogus sexual abuse claim, prosecutors allege.
The statute of limitations for the alleged sexual abuse has long since lapsed, but Collins acknowledged it is undeniably compelling that prosecutors would want to see Hastert punished with more than what amounts to a probationary sentence.
Prosecutors say agents initially had no inkling sexual abuse was behind the payments Hastert made to Individual A. When Hastert said Individual A was extorting him, agents even helped stage and record phone conversations with the former wrestler.
Once one of Illinois’ most popular and powerful politicians, Hastert has been abandoned by many of his friends and former colleagues since his bombshell indictment on hush-money charges in May 2015, his lawyers wrote in a recent court filing seeking probation. They said that the bank fraud was related to payoffs that Hastert made to someone from his past in Yorkville for unspecified misconduct years ago.
The lawyers for former House speaker Dennis Hastert, who as a lawmaker championed stiff punishment for child predators, offered a jaw-dropping retort to allegations that he had molested a boy whom he coached before launching his political career. Those lies, unlike the abuse allegations, were not distant history, the judge said. They described it as sexual abuse.
A 76-year-old man serving a life sentence for the 1957 slaying of an IL schoolgirl is hoping to be set free at a hearing Friday.
John Gallo, Hastert’s Chicago-based attorney, said the defense did not intend to call any witnesses at sentencing.
Prosecutors alleged that Hastert performed a sex act on two wrestlers at separate times and inappropriately touched two other wrestlers once each while giving them massages.
Hastert, 74, faces anywhere from probation to five years in prison, although his plea agreement calls for a sentence of no more than six months behind bars.
Hastert has already suffered “profound humiliation and public shaming” and is in poor health, Green added.
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Durkin could impose the maximum penalty of five years in prison.
