Former Illinois Speaker Michael Madigan departs from his lawyers' office, March 9, 2022, after making his first virtual court appearance for his indictment.
Hours later, lawyers for AT&T Illinois appeared at the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse to confirm before a judge the company has entered into a deferred prosecution agreement with the U.S. attorney’s office, admitting its role in the scheme and agreeing to pay a $23 million and cooperate in the investigation. In exchange, prosecutors will drop criminal charges filed against the company in two years.During the brief hearing before U.S. District Judge Jorge Alonso, Assistant U.S.
Arraignments for Madigan and McClain have not yet been scheduled. Their attorneys have declined to comment.that federal prosecutors had notified them they were considering filing criminal charges against its Illinois subsidiary, formally known as Illinois Bell Telephone Co. LLC, involving “a single, nine-month consulting contract in 2017″ worth $22,500.
According to a statement of facts agreed to by AT&T, in 2015, Madigan’s office had blocked the controversial landline legislation. “I would hope that as long as we explain the approach to McClain and gets the money then the ultimate objective is reached,” one of the executives wrote back, according to the statement.
At McClain’s direction, AT&T employees then met with Acevedo to discuss a “pretextual” reason for the payments: to “prepare a report on the political dynamics of the General Assembly’s and Chicago City Council’s Latino Caucuses,” according to the statement of facts.Acevedo never did any real work for AT&T Illinois, however. In fact, according to AT&T’s admissions in court, he balked at first at the payments, saying they were too low.