Blagojevich eager for legal fight
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| Former Gov. Rod Blagojevich (center) leaves the federal court building Tuesday after being arraigned on federal corruption charges in Chicago. (AP photo) |
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CHICAGO – Rod Blagojevich appeared relaxed and breezy, far from stressed.
He soaked up the attention as reporters and cameras swirled around him, almost as if he were back on the campaign trail, running for governor one more time – and expecting to win.
When a TV cameraman stood atop a concrete pillar outside Chicago’s federal courthouse to get a shot from above, Blagojevich obligingly looked up and smiled.
He even stopped in the lobby to hug and kiss a well-wisher.
In a courtroom upstairs, the impeached and ousted governor said little as he pleaded not guilty Tuesday to racketeering and fraud charges that could send him to federal prison for years.
Downstairs, he smiled and chatted amiably despite finding himself without a full legal team in place and facing serious money woes – expressing the same easy confidence displayed since his Dec. 9 arrest on corruption charges that include allegations of a scheme to sell President Obama’s former U.S. Senate seat.
An attorney close to his legal defense said Blagojevich even wants the court’s permission to leave the country to appear on a reality TV show in the Costa Rican jungle. The attorney spoke on the condition of anonymity, saying the plan was confidential.
“Now we can begin the process of getting the truth out, and I can clear my name and vindicate myself,” Blagojevich said at the courthouse.
“It’s the end of the beginning in one respect but it’s the beginning of another aspect” of the case, he said. “That is the beginning of me being able to prove and clear my name and be vindicated of what are inaccurate allegations.”
At the 10-minute arraignment, Blagojevich and the only attorney currently on his case, longtime friend Sheldon Sorosky, entered a plea of not guilty.
U.S. District Judge James B. Zagel then started a sequence of legal maneuvers that attorneys said would most likely lead to a Blagojevich trial a year or two down the road.
Prosecutors must give the defense team mounds of documents and recordings made over years of investigation. Defense attorneys can then be expected to ask Zagel to throw out much of it.
“The circumstances of these wiretaps hasn’t been flushed out yet,” said DePaul University law professor Leonard Cavise. “We can expect all kinds of motions to suppress evidence. They will challenge the warrants. They will challenge whether the government had probable cause” to tap Blagojevich’s home and campaign office phones.
Cavise estimated that the case would come to trial within two years. But it could take a good deal longer if the government adds more charges or new defendants.
“The [R&B singer] R. Kelly case took six years,” Cavise noted.
The sheer bulk of evidence that defense attorneys must sift through underlines the enormous problem facing Blagojevich: his legal team isn’t in place.
The lack of a legal team can be traced to a lack of money.
Sorosky told Zagel he was seeking prosecutors’ permission to tap Blagojevich’s $2 million campaign fund to pay additional attorneys because much more legal muscle is needed to mount an adequate defense.
“It’s just not possible for just one lawyer to defend Mr. Blagojevich, no matter who that lawyer may be,” Sorosky told the judge
Outside court, Sorosky said even with the campaign fund Blagojevich “does not have sufficient funds to pay for lawyers.” Sorosky recalled that the blue-chip law firm of Winston & Strawn had defended former Gov. George Ryan on racketeering and fraud charges and that chief counsel Dan K. Webb estimated the total cost at millions of dollars.
Winston & Strawn defended Ryan for free, but no big-name lawyers are lining up to do the same for Blagojevich.
“What was it that Jerry McGuire said?” Sorosky said as he entered a coffee shop across from the courthouse still trailed by reporters and cameras.
“Show me the money,” a TV reporter yelled out.
One of the city’s top criminal lawyers, Edward M. Genson, had been Blagojevich’s chief defense counsel. But he resigned after the former governor was deaf to Genson’s entreaties to stop sounding off on TV interview shows.
Genson law partner Terence P. Gillespie announced more than a month later that he would be stepping in. But he had to withdraw because he previously represented a Blagojevich co-defendant, Springfield millionaire William Cellini.
Attention has focused recently on the possibility that veteran defense attorney Thomas Breen might be brought in. But no agreement has been reached so far.
Robert Blagojevich, a self-employed real estate investor, told reporters after entering his not guilty plea that he was “prepared to cope with the charges and work through them.”
His attorney, Michael Ettinger, acknowledged that the case had put stress on the brothers’ relationship. Rod Blagojevich brought his brother on to head his campaign fund after federal prosecutors began investigating an earlier fund chairman, businessman Christopher G. Kelly.
“Everything is going to work out between the two of them, and obviously the type of situation they’re both in, it’s a little strain, but everything’s fine,” Ettinger said.
Kelly and Cellini are to be arraigned Thursday, as is co-defendant John Harris, a former Blagojevich chief of staff whose attorneys have said he is cooperating in the government’s investigation. Another former chief of staff, Alonzo Monk, is to be arraigned next week.
During an unrelated Tuesday appearance at a West Side school, Gov. Pat Quinn told reporters the state has to “take the integrity crisis caused by my predecessor and his predecessor and confront that once and for all and disinfect Illinois government.”
Quinn said reforms had been made but “we have a long way to go.”
