From State Rep. Dan Ugaste:
Judge hands 2 years in prison to ex-ComEd lobbyist Michael McClain, calls bribery scheme with Speaker Madigan a ‘criminal alliance’
Michael McClain, a longtime lobbyist for utility giant Commonwealth Edison who was also a close confidant of then-House Speaker Michael Madigan, has always insisted that what federal prosecutors claimed was an elaborate scheme to bribe the powerful speaker was nothing more than relationship-building.
But at McClain’s long-awaited sentencing hearing Thursday, a judge called it a “false narrative” to suggest what McClain did was time-honored legal lobbying or simply passing along job recommendations from a politician.
If it was aboveboard, U.S. District Judge Manish Shah said, why would he try to conceal it so elaborately?
“Aligning with Mr. Madigan made good strategic sense from your point of view, but that was a criminal alliance,” Shah said.
“You preferred secrecy and lies.
“You preferred Mr. Madigan.
“You chose his way, and the consequences of that choice are yours to bear.”
Minutes later, Shah handed McClain a two-year prison sentence for his central role in a scheme to funnel hundreds of thousands of dollars in no-work contracts and other perks to Madigan associates in exchange for the speaker’s help with ComEd’s ambitious legislative agenda. […]
McClain is the third of the four defendants to be sentenced in the “ComEd Four” case.
Earlier this week, former ComEd CEO Anne Pramaggiore was also given two years in prison by Shah.
John Hooker, the utility’s former top internal lobbyist, received a year and a half behind bars at a hearing last week.
Consultant Jay Doherty, the former head of the City Club of Chicago, will be sentenced next month.
Of all the players swirling in the bribery scandal, however, from precinct captains and political directors to legislators and lobbyists, it was McClain who held the ultimate catbird seat.
He toiled for years in relative obscurity, known mostly by Springfield insiders and political reporters as the former legislator from downstate Quincy with the thick prescription glasses who always seemed to be hanging around Madigan’s office suite in the Capitol.
But it was through his close relationship with Illinois’ most powerful and reticent politician, prosecutors say, that McClain was able to leverage knowledge of the speaker’s thinking to induce ComEd executives to lavish money on Madigan’s cronies and scramble to meet his myriad other demands.
Read more about the ComEd Four’s sentencing from the Chicago Tribune.
