Former US Speaker Dennis Hastert indicted

I wonder if Accuser B knew that Accuser A was promised 3.5 million in hush money. I can just see Accuser B slapping his forehead and saying "Doh! I could have had a V-8!" And then there is Hastert who has had to live, for the last 40 years, with the fear that his twisted--in the eyes of his party-- sexual desires would surface and (gasp!) ruin his public image. In the last four or five years he must have looked around at the times a changing and slapped himself on the forehead and thought "doh! I could have had a real relationship with a man that i loved, a man who loved me. I didn't have to diddle a kid in the dark!" Irony. The whole damned thing is shot through and through with irony--s6

clintl said:

If you're talking about just the lying to the FBI and the financial shenanigans, sure. But neither of those things even happen without some prior act that the person wants to kept hidden, so I don't see any logic in separating them - it's all part of the same chain of offenses.

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My only reason for separating them was to clarify why I thought the blackmailer should have been indicted as well.

I can sympathize with a potential victim of Hastert here, someone who was possibly abused/molested/what have you when they were much younger. But if that same person became a blackmailer, I have no respect for that decision and feel they should be held to account legally for engaging in blackmail.

Doesn't make them a worse person than Hastert appears to be in the least. What he is accused of doing--and I believe did do--is unforgivable. And more than anything else, it highlights a need to revisit the statute of limitations for these kinds of crimes, because if Hastert is guilty of this stuff, he's not going to end up anywhere close to paying the piper (yet another example of Karma not really being much of a bitch).

robeiae said:

Regardless, my initial reply was to this (my boldface):

And while it may be too late to legally prosecute Hastert, if the allegations against him are proven during this related case, some measure of justice may still be done.

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You're a long way from that now, no?

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No. I am aware that he can't be charged with sexual assault at this point ("...while it may be too late to legally prosecute Hastert...") On the other hand, I do feel the details of his sexual assaults will come out and be known because of the related court case ("...if the allegations against him are proven during this related case...")

While it won't be proven by prosecutors, necessarily, because those aren't the charges being pursued, I believe the accusations will be "proven" enough for the general public to generally accept them as true. And that, I feel, could potentially bring a sense of closure to the victims and also damage Hastert's clout, reputation, and image. ("... some measure of justice may still be done.") The next sentence, which you did not quote, was "He may lose clout and there may finally be closure." I would think that would make all the points I'm so busy clarifying seem pretty clear from the get-go, but I guess not.

My later posts were elaborations on what I meant by the quoted section, not steps away from it. I'm not going to continue to elaborate, because at this point, it'd be nothing more than running in circles.

robeiae said:

I can sympathize with a potential victim of Hastert here, someone who was possibly abused/molested/what have you when they were much younger. But if that same person became a blackmailer, I have no respect for that decision and feel they should be held to account legally for engaging in blackmail.

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If the timeline being put forth is right, whatever occurred, occurred 29 or 30+ years before the 2010 agreement that resulted in the illicit money transactions. If it is blackmail, that (in my head) is different than... an in the moment bribe, for example. It reads as more premeditation than an emotion driven attempt at revenge. But, even thinking that through, I could be very wrong. *shrug*

robeiae said:

Oh, I think it's more than likely Hastert did some very bad things, that he's guilty of one sex crime or another with at lest one underage boy. I agree, no one keeps ponying up that kind of money over an empty allegation.

But you're missing the point.

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I'm not missing the point. I don't agree with the point.

robeiae said:

I'm only talking about the blackmailing and the charges that could result from that. Suppose I'm blackmailing you. Like Hastert, you pay me with big chunks of cash. The bank reports the withdrawals, the FBI investigates and asks you were the money went. You lie. You can be charged with a crime for lying to the FBI. I can be charged for a crime for blackmailing you. Are you saying that a fair percentage of people would think you were just as much of a criminal as me in this scenario? Because I find that highly unlikely. Most people would see the blackmailer as more of a criminal, as the one more deserving of punishment.

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I don't give a shit what "most people" would see. "Most people" aren't paying this any attention at all. What "most people" see or hear or say or think has nothing to do with me. Especially if they have no knowledge of what happened in the first place.

You're saying the act of being "blackmailed" (and that's your word, not the Justice Department) is worse than whatever act precipitated it. That's nonsense.

robeiae said:

When it comes to the specific crimes that can people can be charged with relating to the blackmail scheme, I disagree. I don't believe the victim of a blackmailer--should be facing worse punishments than the actual blackmailer with regard to the blackmailing and nothing else. Which is why I think the blackmailer in this case should have been indicted as well. And again, I don't know for certain that they weren't. But I don't get the opposition to this, the apparent willingness to ignore the criminal behavior of the blackmailer.

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Why not? You seem perfectly willing to ignore the possible criminal behavior of Hastert which may have put him in a position to be extorted.

Denny Hastert is not a victim. That remains to be determined. Just as it remains equally uncertain there IS a "blackmail scheme." You like suppositions, so here's one: Suppose Unnamed Individual's attorney calls a press conference next week and declares in her/his possession is a signed contract between Hastert and Unnamed Individual to pay him $3.5 million?

Poof. Better find another alibi because that one ain't gonna fly.

The feds aren't prosecuting Hastert for being a supposed scummy kiddie diddler. They're prosecuting him for trying to circumvent the banking laws and lying to the FBI what the money was for. As to why the Unnamed Individual isn't being prosecuted, maybe he hasn't committed any crime to be prosecuted for. There's nothing illegal about accepting money as a willingly given gift. At least as long as its reported to the I.R.S. that your good buddy Denny sent me another check for $10K this month out of the goodness of his heart.

What we DON'T know about this case vastly outstrips what we DO know. Hastert hasn't even appeared in a courtroom yet and already you're declaring him the victim of both an evil extortionist and a mean ol' government that won't let him spend his money the way he wants. Boo and hoo.

Really, it's almost admirable the way you're trying to make it seem as though Hastert has been done wrong first by a unsavory creep and then by an overzealous federal prosecutor. Unfortunately for this tissue-thin defense of Denny the Possible Kid Diddler, you can't maximize the reaction of paying money to keep his secrets a secret while minimizing the acts which he so desperately wants no one to ever learn of.

However, if there are more Unnamed Individuals who weren't being given millions to shut up and cash checks, they will have little reason not to come forward. As Bill Cosby found out, everything hidden eventually is revealed. This irrefutable truth will not pass Denny Hastert by.

nighttimer said:

You're saying the act of being "blackmailed" (and that's your word, not the Justice Department) is worse than whatever act precipitated it.

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No, I'm not. As I've explained. Sorry you don't understand, but I don't know how to make it any clearer.

robeiae said:

No, I'm not. As I've explained. Sorry you don't understand, but I don't know how to make it any clearer.

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Okie dokie.

A Predator Becomes Prey

Bye-bye, Denny.

CHICAGO (AP) — Dennis Hastert, the Republican who for eight years presided over the House and was second in the line of succession to the presidency, was sentenced Wednesday to more than a year in prison in the hush-money case that included accusations he sexually abused teenagers while coaching high school wrestling.

Judge Thomas M. Durkin also ordered Hastert to undergo sex-offender treatment, spend two years on supervised release after 15 months behind bars and pay a $250,000 fine to a crime victims' fund.

In explaining his punishment, the judge called Hastert a "serial child molester" and described as "unconscionable" his attempt to accuse one of the victims of extortion.

Hastert becomes one of the highest-ranking politicians in American history to be sentenced to prison. He pleaded guilty last fall to violating banking law as he sought to pay $3.5 million to someone referred to in court papers only as Individual A to keep the sex abuse secret.

Earlier in the hearing, a former athlete who said he was molested by Hastert decades ago told the courtroom that he was "devastated" by the abuse.

The man, now in his 50s, said Hastert abused him while they were alone in a locker room. He struggled to hold back tears as he described the incident in detail. In the years since, he said, he sought professional help and had trouble sleeping. He said the memory still causes him pain.

He said he trusted and looked up to Hastert.

In his own statement, Hastert admitted that he "mistreated" some of his athletes and said he was "deeply ashamed."

"I am sorry to those I hurt and misled," he said. "What I did was wrong and I regret it."

When the judge asked whether he sexually abused one wrestler specifically, Hastert said yes.

Moments before the man took the stand, a woman who says her brother was sexually abused by Hastert told the courtroom that her sibling felt "betrayed, ashamed and embarrassed."

Jolene Burdge said Hastert abused her brother, Stephen Reinboldt, throughout his years at Yorkville High School, where Hastert was a history teacher and coach from 1965 to 1981.

Reinboldt died of AIDS in 1995.

His sister turned toward Hastert and said, "Don't be a coward ... tell the truth."

She also said, "I hope I have been your worst nightmare."

Authorities said Hastert abused at least four students throughout his years at the school about 45 miles southwest of Chicago.

The 74-year-old, who was pushed into the courthouse in Chicago in a wheelchair, agreed to a plea deal that suggested anything from probation to a maximum of six months behind bars.

But after prosecutors lifted a veil of secrecy from the case, the judge made comments suggesting he might impose a longer sentence, potentially putting Hastert behind bars for years, because of the abuse allegations.

Defense attorneys were seeking probation on the grounds that Hastert has already paid a high price in disgrace. They also cited his health, saying a blood infection nearly killed him in November and that a stroke has limited his mobility.

The lead prosecutor said he wishes Hastert could have been charged with the abuse he was trying to cover up.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven Block called Hastert's conduct "horrendous." But because of the statute of limitations, he could only be charged with a financial crime related to the payments he was making to one of at least four victims of sexual abuse.

Block said the sentence should take into account that Hastert "continues to deny what should now be obvious to everyone," that the payments were to conceal sexual abuse.

Defense attorney Thomas Green said he "acknowledges and respects" the pain of the man who described being molested. He urged the judge to take into consideration the "entire arc" of Hastert's life, asserting that he reshaped his life as a public servant during his political career.

"Decades of not just political achievement but acts of goodness and charity have been erased, a lot of it even physically as his name has been removed from public places and his portrait at the Capitol put into storage," Green said.

Some letters of support were withdrawn because the writers did not want to be identified, Green said, an example of Hastert's deepening isolation.

The maximum sentence available was five years in prison.

Until recently, it was hard to gauge what Durkin might be thinking. But at a recent hearing, he let his dismay show for the first time.

He singled out how Hastert in a 2015 interview with federal agents sought to deflect blame by falsely accusing Individual A of extorting him with a bogus sex-abuse claim.

On Wednesday, the judge returned to that example, saying that Hastert was willing to send an innocent man to prison to avoid getting caught.

Because of Hastert's false accusations, "the full weight of the federal government's resources" was thrown at Individual A, the judge said.

Earlier this month, prosecutors went into graphic detail about the sex-abuse allegations for the first time, even describing how Hastert would sit in a recliner chair in the locker room with a direct view of the showers.

The victims, prosecutors said, were boys between 14 and 17. Hastert was in his 20s and 30s.

Only 15 months?!

RedRajah said:

Only 15 months?!

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That was my take on it. But they couldn't convict him on the molestation charges, apparently, as they happened too long ago.

Let's hope that the Hastert rule (a majority of the majority to bring legislation to the house floor) falls into as much disfavor as the man it is named after. Shouldn't that be Dennis Bastert?

Regardless of the nuances, legal or otherwise, Dennis Hastert is a shitwad of a human being, and will now forever be recorded as that. The FACT that the Republican Party in Congress made this man SPEAKER OF THE GODDAMN HOUSE is forever to their shame and should be engraved somewhere on a big monument in Washington, D.C.

Beyond that, I really don't care what happens to him at this point.

caw

blacbird said:

Regardless of the nuances, legal or otherwise, Dennis Hastert is a shitwad of a human being, and will now forever be recorded as that. The FACT that the Republican Party in Congress made this man SPEAKER OF THE GODDAMN HOUSE is forever to their shame and should be engraved somewhere on a big monument in Washington, D.C.

Beyond that, I really don't care what happens to him at this point.

caw

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I expect when the Republicans made him Speaker, they weren't aware of his coaching proclivities. That doesn't clear him or them. I expect there have been more than he who would earn our wrath as well. Some we may know of, some we may never know. But I'm glad he's spending time in prison, because he needs to. Not that that will stop future politicians from doing any damn thing they think they can get away with. Which includes politicians from both parties, as it has in the past.

ETA: Beyond that, I don't care what happens to him either.

Haggis said:

I expect when the Republicans made him Speaker, they weren't aware of his coaching proclivities. That doesn't clear him or them.

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Any more that it cleared Joe Paterno for "not knowing" about Jerry Sandusky.

caw

blacbird said:

Any more that it cleared Joe Paterno for "not knowing" about Jerry Sandusky.

caw

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You're stretching it, CAW.

You're suggesting that 30 or 40 years later, the Repubs should have known what he did when he was coaching wrestling in his 20s?

And regarding JoPa. Don't look to me to be a supporter his legacy. There are plenty of others around who would be happy to take up that case. I'm not one of them. I think there are few who are willing to take up Sandusky's case.