Crime & Law
Prosecutors Get Chance to Question Michael Madigan in Ex-Speaker’s Landmark Corruption Trial
Michael Madigan last week testified at his landmark corruption trial that he became “very angry” when he learned his associates had been doing little or no work for years after receiving contractor jobs with utility giant Commonwealth Edison.
But on Monday, jurors heard a wiretapped phone call in which the longtime House speaker seemed to laugh off the notion that some had “made out like bandits” while doing essentially no work.
That call was played in court during Madigan’s third day on the witness stand as government prosecutors launched into their cross-examination of the man who had long been Illinois’ most powerful politician.
Madigan, who is charged alongside his longtime right-hand man Michael McClain, is alleged to have orchestrated multiple corruption schemes, wielding his political power to reward loyal allies and enrich himself.
He and McClain are charged with racketeering, bribery and wire fraud. They have each pleaded not guilty.
The government cross-examination marks possibly the most critical point of the monthslong trial.
In the most extensive scheme alleged by prosecutors, Madigan and McClain are accused of arranging subcontractor jobs for several of the speaker’s associates — including 13th Ward precinct captains Ray Nice and Ed Moody, and former Chicago Alds. Frank Olivo and Michael Zalewski — with ComEd, which prosecutors claim paid out more than $1 million to those individuals even as they did little or no work.
Those subcontractors were paid through an intermediary, Jay Doherty, who along with McClain and others was convicted in the 2023 “ComEd Four” trial of conspiring to bribe Madigan.
Before Madigan retook the witness stand Monday afternoon, attorneys in the case spent the entire morning arguing over which issues Madigan could actually be questioned on — including the so-called “bandits” tape.
“Some of these guys have made out like bandits, Mike,” Madigan said during a wiretapped phone conversation with McClain in August 2018.
“Oh my God, for very little work, too,” McClain added. “Very little work.”
“Yeah,” Madigan replied on the call.
That conversation was about Dennis Gannon, a labor consultant with ComEd, but under questioning from Assistant U.S. Attorney Amarjeet Bhachu, Madigan confirmed in court Monday that it was his voice on the call, that it was him laughing on the tape and that he referred to multiple people by using the term “bandits.”
Judge John Blakey had previously refused to admit the “bandits” tape — and it was similarly barred from the “ComEd Four” trial in 2023 — but prosecutors urged him to reconsider after Madigan last week told jurors he was “very angry” when he learned his allies who’d received consulting contracts with ComEd were essentially handed no-work jobs.
Blakey agreed, stating last week that “the door is open” to admitting that tape following Madigan’s testimony. But his defense attorneys maintained that the recorded conversation was not about the ComEd subcontractors and that allowing the tape would give jurors a “false inference” about who they were talking about.
Prosecutors have argued that the fact Madigan mentioned “guys” and “bandits” — plural — showed he was aware and unconcerned that others, too, were not working as they should be.
Last week on his direct testimony, Madigan denied any knowledge that the ComEd subcontractors had been doing no work for the company.
But Bhachu noted that, at least in the case of Olivo, he and Madigan had been very close, having been neighbors for a decade or more and continuing to work alongside one another in Chicago’s 13th Ward throughout their political careers.
Bhachu also showed jurors a message from Olivo’s son congratulating the speaker on the 2012 elections and referring to Madigan as “Uncle Mike.”
“It’s your testimony today, is it, that you had no idea that your longtime friend and political ally, whose son calls you ‘uncle,’ was getting paid eight years straight for doing little to no work for ComEd?” Bhachu asked.
“That’s my testimony,” Madigan replied.
Madigan also acknowledged that he knew Nice was being paid by Doherty, but he claimed he didn’t know precisely how he knew that information once Bhachu asked him to get specific about how he learned that.
Madigan denied knowing the subcontractors did no work for ComEd. Last week, he claimed he did little more than pass the names of his allies off to McClain — who worked as a contract lobbyist for the utility giant — to see if his friend could find them any help.
The most contentious testimony of the day dealt with Madigan’s conversation between himself and Danny Solis — the disgraced former alderperson and Zoning Committee chair who agreed to wear a wire and secretly record numerous calls and conversations for the government.
In a June 2017 call between him and Madigan about the developer of the Union West property in Chicago, Solis mentioned to Madigan, “I think they understand how this works, you know the quid pro quo.”
“Yeah, OK,” Madigan replied on the recording.
Madigan last week claimed he felt a “great deal of surprise and concern” when he heard those comments, but Bhachu noted that Madigan spoke with Solis multiple more times before he ultimately confronted him weeks later and told him not to use the term “quid pro quo.”
“I was just carrying the conversation … and moving it towards an end,” Madigan said Monday.
Madigan also confirmed that it was him who approached Solis about setting up an introduction to the Union West developers. When he confronted Solis about the “quid pro quo” comment, Madigan also suggested that he only wanted to meet with the developers because the project could face trouble if they didn’t get their real estate taxes in order.
He testified Monday though that he did not believe the project was in any real trouble at that time.
Madigan also said that despite this “quid pro quo” incident, he was still willing to recommend Solis for a state board position the following year, telling jurors he felt he’d “delivered the message” to Solis “that there’d be no quid pro quo.”
The former speaker on Monday also continued to distance himself from his co-defendant, a man whom he’d been close with for decades.
Bhachu showed jurors a note from McClain thanking Madigan for attending his retirement party and an email in which McClain wrote that he was “at the bridge with my musket standing with and for the Madigan family.”
But Madigan testified that he didn’t “think I was as loyal to him as he was to me” and couldn’t recall a time where he ever told McClain he appreciated their friendship. He claimed he would listen to McClain’s advice, but rarely relied solely on that and balked at the notion that he was “loyal” to McClain.
“If the definition of loyalty,” Madigan said, “is that I viewed him as a friend and I wouldn’t do anything to hurt him, then yes.”
McClain’s defense team on Monday also signaled that they intend to ask Blakey to reconsider their motion to sever their client’s trial from Madigan’s. They had unsuccessfully sought to split the trials before jury selection began, and plan to ask the judge to do so once again later this week.
