Recently Unsealed Court Documents Confirm Obama Heavily Embroiled in Rezko Case
By Un coup de des on June 27, 2008 at 1:36 PM in Barack Obama, Chicago, Chicago politics, Patrick Fitzgerald, Rezko, Tony Rezko
According to today’s edition of the Chicago Sun-Times, “Barack Obama’s name could have been invoked more at the corruption trial of his former fund-raiser Tony Rezko.” But prosecutors instead chose to focus on the first target of Fitzgerald’s probe: convicted slumlord and notorious Chicago political fixer Antoin “Tony” Rezko, the man who helped Obama purchase his Kenwood mansion in 2005.
The prosecutors’ decision to refrain from discussing Obama’s deep imbrication in the Rezko scandal during the trial does not exonerate the Senator from Illinois, however. I quote US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, who issued the following admonition in the wake of Rezko’s conviction:
U.S. Attorney Patrick J. Fitzgerald said the verdict represented “an antidote to the poison of corruption” that trial testimony alleged included the fixing of state boards that controlled a $40 billion pension fund and made major decisions about million-dollar hospital construction. He expressed hope it would have an effect on Illinois politicians. “If morals don’t get to them, I hope the fear of going to jail does,” Fitzgerald told reporters.
Fitzgerald and the prosecutors are particularly concerned with Obama’s acceptance of “straw” campaign contributions others made on Rezko’s behalf. I quote the Sun-Times:
The Illinois senator was the recipient of “straw” campaign contributions made by others on behalf of Rezko — money that Obama has since given to charities.
The documents indicate that prosecutors considered offering witnesses to explore why Rezko used others to contribute to Obama and also to Blagojevich, and U.S. District Judge Amy J. St. Eve ruled that they could. But they did not end up offering any such testimony during the trial.
“Witnesses will testify that Rezko was a long-standing supporter and fund-raiser of Barack Obama,” prosecutors wrote.
One contribution with which prosecutors are concerned is the donation Joseph Aramanda, an associate of Rezko who is also known as “Individual D” in the superseding indictment Fitzgerald’s prosecutors filed, submitted to Obama in 2004. A Chicago Sun-Times article dated 24 December 2007 summarizes the situation quite succinctly:
Aramanda is identified as “Individual D” in Rezko’s indictment. And when Levine pleaded guilty in October, Aramanda again was listed as “Individual D.”
Aramanda was identified by the Sun-Times as “Individual D,” who allegedly received a $250,000 kickback tied to a scheme to steer lucrative state pension deals to firms and consultants that donated to Blagojevich. Aramanda is not specifically named or charged with criminal wrongdoing in the court papers. He did not return a call seeking comment Saturday.
Aramanda’s son, by the way, was rewarded an internship in Obama’s Senate office in Washington, DC, at the behest of Antoin “Tony” Rezko. Why do the words quid pro quo come to mind unbidden?
Because the evidence the prosecutors presented regarding Obama’s involvement with Rezko and Aramanda is so compelling, Judge St. Eve ruled it was appropriate for prosecutors to invoke the name of Barack Obama during the Rezko trial. All this prompts a few questions:
- Do the prosecutors involved in Operation Board Games intend to broach other aspects of Obama’s deep and problematic entanglements with Antoin “Tony” Rezko?
- Will this scandal resurface after the Democratic Convention in August?
- Is Rezko the first of many corrupt Chicago machine dominoes to fall?
- Are Presidential candidates usually embroiled in fraudulent schemes involving investment firms, the Illinois Teachers’ Pension Fund and questionable campaign contributions?
No Quarter promises to alert readers to any and all developments involing Patrick Fitzgerald, Barack Obama and the unscrupulous Antoin “Tony” Rezko.
No Quarter dossier on Obama and Rezko:
- The Illinois Combine II: The DNC Moves Into Chicago
- Obama’s Gangster Mentality
- Prescience: “Will Rezko Blow Up Obama?”
- The Epistolary Rezko
- The Tipping Point?
- Barack, The Truth Ain’t A Smear
- Patrick Fitzgerald Issues Obama A Warning
- What Hypocrite Obama Should Have Discussion during His Wesleyan Commencement Address
- Barack Obama’s Candidacy as a Take on The Picture of Dorian Gray
- A Majority of One: On Losing the Democratic Base
- Ok, So Tell Us What IS Allowed
- Two Lone Voices Speak for Millions of Us
- What’ll Be Left of the Democratic Party
- It Ain’t Over: Obama MAY Have to Pay the Piper After All
- Obama to Donate Contribution from Rezko’s Iraqi Friend
- Be My Friend, Godfather
- Jaws V, Starring Barack Obama
- The Chicago Three: Obama, Ayers & Rezko
- Charlie Gibson, Will You Ask Barack about Nadhmi Auchi?
- Saddam Hussein, Barack Hussein Obama’s Hidden Real Estate Partner?
- Barack “I-Didn’t-Know” Obama
- Those Who Haunt Him
- Hillary’s Campaign Comes out Swinging
- “Nobie and Obama”
- Authorization to Use Misleading Falsehoods
- What We’ve Noticed about the Speech
- This Is for Main Street (And for the Forgotten People Barack Obama Doesn’t Know)
- Michelle Obama: “Give Us Something Here”
- Rezko Muckrakers Alert!
- The Forgotten People
- Irrefutable Proof That Obama’s Own District Was Home to 11 Rezko Foreclosed Properties
- Speak the Truth, Fallout Be Damned
- The Rezko Saga: Two Videos
- Get Your Daily Rezko Dose Here
- The Media’s Panderbears, Part I
- Sunday Scoops: Rezko-gate and Adviser-gate
- Obama’s Prime-Slime Advisors
- Good Morning, Barack! (Rezko Got Jobs for Your Staffers? Do Tell.)
- Today’s Rezko Trial Scoops (And Prosecutors on $20K Kickback to Obama)
- ABC News: Rezko $50 Million in Debt
- 312.321.2417
- (Pants on Fire!) Lynn Sweet: Obama and His Taking Questions on Rezko
- Rezko Trial: Obama May Be Witness
- Obama’s Judgment on the Eve of Judgment Day
- Truthtelling from Lanny Davis (What about “Iron My Shirt?”)
- Experience, and Experiences (of the Rezko Sort)
- No He Can’t Because Yes They Will
- More Questions on Rezko
- “Obama Bagman” in Jail
- Democratic Death Wish
- How to Buy A Mansion You Can’t Afford
- Will Rezko Blow Up Obama?
- It is “Possible” Obama Was Aware of Rezko’s Financial and Legal Woes
- 20-Year Associate of Obama Arrested
- Look before You Leap: Obama’s Mobbed-Up Allies
- Politics Is A Blood Sport
- BREAKING: ABC News Reports $100,000 from Rezko That Obama Hasn’t Returned
- CNN on Rezko and Obama: This Is Obama’s “Slumwater”
- FACT CHECK: Obama, His Contributor Rezko, The Slum Landlord Business
- A Dope with Hope?
- Obama/Rezko: It Comes down to Judgment
- Didn’t Obama Watch The Firm
- Steve Clemons on Tonight’s Debate
- Patrick Fitzgerald Ties Obama to Rezko Indictments
- All in for Hillary
- Obama, His Lobbyists and His Cronies
RezkoWatch contains even more information on Obama’s deep and problematic ties to convicted slumlord and notorious political fixer Antoin “Tony” Rezko.
I have it from sources deep in the Chicago US Attorney’s office that they are actively pursuing charges against Obama but they understand the need for compelling irrefutable evidence and are proceeding with caution. The other side of this is that the US attorney’s office is well aware that if Obama wins before they can indict him and Daley, then Obama is going to replace Fitzgerald and kill the investigation post haste.
Certainly hope something happens soon. Time is running out and bo belongs behind bars. He can flush his crap down the toilet there instead of trying to cram it down our throats.
Crooks, crooks, and more Crooks!
Obama is as crooked as they come. The guy creeps me out more and more. I certainly hope your people in the Chicago US Attorney’s office are working as fast as they can on this. It’s of vital importance to the US.
Bambi’s shown he’s clearly not what he appears to be, and is falsifying documents (like his birth certificate), and will clearly squelch this if he wins before they get an indictment.
Hmmmmm He’s more and more Bush-like every day. Another little ‘titan’ who will use his power with out thinking of the legalities. I mean, he already has shown his ‘constitutional colors’ with his FISA vote.
I shudder to think what’s down the road.
Oh, for God’s sake! For the last fucking time, you stupid numbnuts out there in right-wing La-La Land –
Nobody falsified Barack Obama’s birth certificate.
He was born out here in Honolulu in 1961. My former boss, Congressman Neil Abercrombie, was both a neighbor and graduate school classmate of Obama’s parents while all three attended the University of Hawaii at Manoa, and he distinctly remembers the blessed event.
Hell, I even met a retired head nurse of obstetrics at The Queen’s Medical Center, and who was actually present at Obama’s birth.
Larry Johnson, your site’s continued role in actively facilitating the knowing and willful dissemination of false information with malice aforethought, i.e., with the intent to cause injury or harm — especially when the bullshit about the birth certificate has been clearly and easily refuted on countless occasions — potentially implicates you in a case of slander and libel. Therefore, you really ought to keep that in mind, and take pains to disassociate yourself from such irresponsible commentary.
the blessed event? Please.
If it’s not falsified, once again, the way to end all speculation is to release a copy of his ORIGINAL Ceritificate of Live Birth.
Are the Sun Times and US Attorney Fitzgerald guilty of slander and libel, too? Or wait, are they just racist, or uneducated, maybe Bible thumpers, huh?
What we do know is Obama is a criminal and you have very few moral standards if you support him.
The troll is here!!
“You people” blah blah
and then condemning Larry Johnson –
This troll is one of the worst of the worst.
Trolls cannot handle the truth — Obama is dirty — Rezko isn’t one of the ELECTED ones in the dirty political machine — OBAMA is one of the ELECTED individuals in the political machine that needs cleaning up!
Get over it Obamabutts — your guy is dirty — very very dirty. For Obama to get where he is now in the Chicago political machines means Obama is dirty — and Rezko will begin to sing BEFORE he is sentenced in September
ya but what about him falsifying documents (like his birth certificate)?
I meant that to be funny, I wanted Donald’s head to spin.
What is the retired nurses name?
Congressman Neil Abercrombie? He will now get requests from the public…Thanks
Sounds like, “I know someone who knows someone..”. Heresay at best. People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.
So great! No Problem! Just publish the birth certificate. Prove it, just like McCain had to. Like I have had to. Like any person in America running for the highest office in the land has to.
If i recall, there is a list of documents that Obama has refused to release.
Why could that be?
He needs to release all of them. We, the people, need to know who and what we are being asked to vote for.
As Hillary has already pointed and for which she got the finger, “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.”
If he has a real one, why does he refuse to
release it….that would end the problem right there.
And you honestly think that ‘proving his birth certificate’ is the ONLY thing we have against the ‘great One’? HA! That’s only ONE of the hundreds of scary revelations we’re finding out about this crafty, sly empty suit.
The way Obamabots talk about him as the 2nd coming of Christ I figured he must have been born in Hawaii. As written in the Book of Obama, Revulsions:1 He will be borne in Hawaii to an atheist and a Muslim and He will be called Hussein. Was he ever baptized in a proper church and is are there any record of it? Did his father attend the service or was he enough of a Muslin to recognize that as a Muslin he couldn’t enter the church. Trying to fill in the blanks of a guy with no past.
Jeepers, this comment is certainly coming out of left field. Did you happen to read the thread title - AT ALL?
What say you to the tread title my little Obamabot with kool-aid on your face?
Hey Donald,
You want to stop this kind of investigation, show us the real birth certificate with seal, that is if he got any. He’s running for this big position and you and I should be informed about the credibility or legitimacy of his citizenship.
Oh my gosh–blessed event??
Well, Barry WAS born in a manger, you know.
(Probably bought and paid for by Tony Rezko!)
Fitzgerald is probably having the same problem the Republicans are having–so much graft to choose from, so little time.
Democrats, too, all that graft, which to choose?
Rezko knows where all of Barack’s birth certificates are buried.
Two immediate thoughts here:
(1) If we have learned anything about Chicago U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald over the past seven years, it’s that he is an honest man who likes to hold his cards close to his vest, and who runs a tight ship that is staffed by a professional crew with even tighter lips. His office is not one that leaks such information, even casually or accidentally.
(2) If your “sources from deep inside the Chicago U.S. Attorney’s office” were true legal professionals such as described above in (1), they wouldn’t be talking so loosely to anyone about any active and ongoing investigation, let alone about one so politically sensitive as to potentially implicate the past practices of the prospective Democratic presidential nominee.
Therefore, I have my doubts as to the veracity of your “sources”. If there is truly any evidence that potentially implicates Barack Obama in wrongdoing, then by federal law it would be incumbent upon Fitzgerald to notify Obama’s attorney in writing that his client is either a subject or the target of a federal investigation, and a new grand jury would be convened, both of which have yet to occur.
Fitzgerald’s office staff has heretofore never actively speculated about someone’s guilt or innocence prior to the act of indictment, and I don’t see them doing that now.
I dont know, maybe Obama received a target letter, or maybe someone is leaning on Fitz.
I hope he finds the courage to do the right thing by the country, even if they threaten his career.
That’s where most men fall, ultimately, they put self before country.
But, you know, someone is ALWAYS watching…
never actively speculated about someone’s guilt or innocence
“heretofore” ???
No need to speculate about it. As Mr. Johnson has said before and it applies to US Attorney Fitzgerald, he deals in facts.
I would love to read his autobiography. The shit that Fitzgerald knows and what he has had to go through to get the facts…
I mean he has had to deal with terrorism, treason and RICO Chicago corrupton… what a mix.
I believe Fitzgerald let Rove squeak by in the Scooter Libby case because he has him dead to rights in the Attorney’s General firing. Ironically Fitzgerald himself was definitely on the list. And also one of Obama’s acquiantances involving embezzling Iraqi infrastructure is connected to the White House. Meeting with George Dubya as early as 2003.
You’re correct that any lawyer worth a spit wouldn’t devulge sensitive information with regards to an on going case. Hypotheticals and nuanced language go a long way when delivered appropriately to critical minds. One possible reason Obama wasn’t brought up in the Rezko trail is that they didn’t want to muddy the water until the appropriate time. There is similar talk about Illinois current govenor.
As an aside some in this same group some thought that Obama might be employing a Sharpton defense, “They are only going after me because I’m running for POTUS.” This was an offensive move and as we can see with how he played the race card in Florida, Obama has no problem playing offense. We shall see if these people are accurate or only talkers I can not verify the information directly.
All I know is that an attorney can get a conviction on a perjury charge, which takes a lot of parsing, then he certainly can nail someone using wired surrogates.
It taking so long because they dig and they keep finding new chit. Daunting task. Obama is a mass criminal, several layers of criminality.
kevin posted this link on another thread.
Boston.com explains more about Obama’s developer friends.
http://tinyurl.com/4own9w
I am writing an essay on that article right now. Expect a series of essays on the Boston Globe expose.
Thanks, I look forward to reading them.
Un coup de des;
Just wanted to say I really enjoy your work.
I was wondering what differences you see in the Globes reporting when compared to the Suntimes’ body of work.
The Globe discusses how this has been a fraudulent scheme since the late 1990s. Or at least they imply the privitization of public housing in chicago is a fraudulent scheme in which Obama has been embroiled. And I believe they are correct.
If you have run into info on how LLC’s and trusts were used as shields, I would love to hear about it.
I agree with you on the housing scheme.
Just how many schemes are there? Wasn’t there one involving state retirement pensions and another about the education system in Chicago? We have white collar crooks where I live, but they are amateurs beside the ones in Chicago.
How does this relate back to the republican schemes to also capitalize on privatization?
Wasn’t this really, in part, the genesis of the combine, in IL, and Washington, DC?
I remember Rumsfeld speaking of privatization, the idea business could do the job better than government, using this excuse to essentially outsource some of the military responsibility ( paid off too, didn’t it? YOW!)while making an illegal fortune for himself, and his buddies in the Pentagon, through Iraq, and elsewhere, by war profiteering. (Also made some money for Alsammarae, Rezko and Obama’s buddy, but then he’s connected to the combine, too, the Chicago-Washington line. I wonder if Glenn Miller wrote a song about that, oh, no, that was Chattanooga, and a train. I keep thinking “plane crash” for some strange reason, today. The only plane crash song I know is “Snoopy and the Red Baron,” by the “Royal Guardsmen,” which I guess explains all those men in stripes, the ones who guard the pope, the “Swiss Guards.” Don’t ask, I digress.)
I hope this issue is researched fairly, the blame goes to republicans and democrats, not just democrats.
Says a lot when the writer only holds ONE party responsible, which, of course, you will not do, I’m sure you will be fair….
Have you read the articles by Evelyn Pringle?
She provides a synopsis that will make your head spin. And yes it does include the Repubs, and points out the vast corruption that has been in Il for over 4 Governorships. Blago and his crew ran on the anti corruption platform.
The crooks in Illinois and the Chicago area all work across Party lines, they are equal-opportunity crooks. Obama was pretty helpful to Rezko by writing those nice letters that would help Rezko get those Gov’t backed loans for his Slum Projects. It’s just too bad the taxpayers get stuck with the tab.
Good……that article was easier to follow than the Chicago Trib gal.
She’s just too deep into details. I don’t question her journalism.
I do question the ability to make that story have legs.
I read the Boston Globe story and “got it.”
We need simpler stories.
No story can be that dang complicated! If so, then it’s like the Republican smear campagaign against the Clintons.
Murder, etc.
I am so not willing to follow the Sinclairs off the cliff. I’m apparently too mentally balanced to entertain conspiracy theories.
This story is simpler. His major doners also were slumlords. It’s not just Rezko.
These creeps made money off of the public to provide housing but didn’t follow through with maintenance, upkeep.
Now they are the worst type of slums…..paid for by good liberals.
This has to stop.
now they’re on his staff, who will be his choice for secretary of HUD?
crackhouses for everyone
maybe these developers will construct the re-education camps
The part where my jaw dropped was here:
Valerie Jarrett, a senior adviser to Obama’s presidential campaign and a member of his finance committee. Jarrett is the chief executive of Habitat Co., which managed Grove Parc Plaza from 2001 until this winter and co-managed an even larger subsidized complex in Chicago that was seized by the federal government in 2006, after city inspectors found widespread problems.
That’s your HUD secretary right there.
Pringle must be hitting close to something. Rezko Watch has an article about Auchi’s lawyer threatening to sue media outlets that are publishing her articles.
Thank you! Do you have a link to this article please?
Evelyn pringle’s piece on operation board games:
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0805/S00325.htm
Here is the Evelyn Pringle piece:
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0805/S00325.htm
Thank you!
I hope so - Obama helped Rezko to get develop those slums and received big donations from Rezko as payback (”pay to play” as it’s known in Chicago) - all the while Obama ignored his poor constituents who lived in Rezko’s slums without heat. Oh yes, and all the while Obama and Michelle gave thousands to TUCC so that Rev. Wright could preach to his followers that all of their problems were due to the racist, white, American government!
And, Obama repeatedly lied to the media about the amounts that he received from Rezko. Obama started off by admitting a $60,000 contribution, but the number kept climbing higher and higher, as Obama was confronted again and again with revealtions that he had donated more - eventually the figure came to $250,000 - and this doesn’t count the amounts from “friends of Rezko,” including other Arab Americans sympathetic to Hamas and the Palestinians.
correction: “revelations”
Obama claims to be giving the “tainted” political donations to charity — WHICH charities?? We really need to know which charities are getting this second-hand dirty money.
The whole BLT needs the mayo of the poor (and two packets of kethup), to call it self a sandwich.
Raise people out of poverty and their BLT is just stale bread.
Did BO commit any selfless acts to help his constituents? Not a God Damn Ameikkkkan thing.
God you are so right. Never made the connection before. Egads!
And the Globe did not open their “expose” for comments because they know better. This stuff has been kicking around for several years in the Chicago Sun Times and Chicago Trib, and the Globe is picking it up now? How different is this stuff from Evelyn Pringle’s articles that have been so ridiculed? Maybe the Globe’s article is a good sign? Ya think? Or just part of the “timed release” of negative stories on days when we have the kissy-kissy feel good “Unity” farce? Do ya think? Other mainstream outlets might inform the public as well? My fave quote from the Globe article has to to with the people who’ve been hurt by Obama mixing it up with Rezko to create slums:
“… some people in Chicago’s poorest neighborhoods are torn between a natural inclination to support Obama and a concern about his relationships with the developers they hold responsible for Chicago’s affordable housing failures. ”
I would ask these poor people who ended up living in an Obama/Rezko slum: This year, was it so important to elect a black man President? Even at the expense of your own lives and the lives of your children? Is it that important that you can swallow being Obama’s pawns for Rezko’s contributions? Is this what we’ve come to? Is that all that matters? While he puts his feet up on the desk in the Oval Office, do you get to chase the rats around the living room? Does anyone remember Hillary Clinton calling him out in one of the debates for his relationship with this “slumlord”? And how she was blasted for doing so? Who was really looking out for you? How did you vote over there in Chicago? What a farce.
While he puts his feet up on the desk in the Oval Office, do you get to chase the rats around the living room?
Well said, that sums him up nicely.
Obama’s connections and deals with his developer friends … and now so many connected to those deals are in his campaign for POTUS …. if they succeed would make corruption in Indonesia (where he grew up and where corruption is a way of life) look like a walk in the park!
Audacious … and dangerous.
For the sake of democracy and America, I hope he is stopped.
Obama will continue to sidestep Rezko.
Obama will continue to distract anything with Rezko with more “promises” of issues he’ll claim he can CHANGE.
With the money Obama is claiming….he will build a Force Shield to combat the attacks……
BUT
Truth will Prevail.
And the Truth is not on Obama’s side.
Count on hearing the Race Card.
As well we have learned, enforcing the law is racist. Even the truth is racist.
BO during his recent presser…I have problems with this statement on so many different levels. BO is pulling a Gary Hart, so lets just call this the “Monkey Business” challenge.
.
Lets start with Emil Jones..”make me senator”…
“http://www.suntimes.com/news/politics/obama/1025587,CST-NWS-obamaforweb26.article”
He is going to regret that challenge.
He’s an independent, and he has friends who come out of the more traditional school of Chicago politics? If we had a real press, all of the reporters would have burst out laughing at that point. Let’s hope there are still some real reporters in Chicago who take the challenge.
Thanks for this great piece, Un coup de des. It’s hard to keep up on the blow-by-blow of BO’s criminal friends.
How and when did Axelrod get involved in the Obamafia? Do you know?
Wasn’t it Obama that said he was tough enough to
go after the Republicans because he had come
through Chicago politics? I think he has two personalities……
Obama’s Dossiere is impressive especially when compared to his so called experience to become the president..No comparison..
Makes me understand Hillary’s unity a bit more, she’ll be there to pick up the pieces and if the Obamabots accept Hillary in this joint campaign effort, they’ll vote for her and the rightful to be president person will be ready ON DAY 1!!
How’s that for some hope??
NOBAMA!
Truth wont prevail. Ovomit will cheat his way into the White House.
He will get millions of fraudulent votes in states other than Illinois and North Carolina. He has ACORN doing his dirty work and he taught them how to do it.
I choose to believe there are enough of us out here, who will never vote for Obama