April 28--Dennis Hastert, once the longest-serving Republican House speaker in U.S. history, was sentenced Wednesday in federal court in Chicago to 15 months in prison in a hush-money case related to Hastert's sexual abuse of teen boys decades ago.
U.S. District Judge Thomas M. Durkin called Hastert a "serial child molester" and said he would have given a lengthier prison term if not for Hastert's age and declining health.
Throughout the judge's remarks, Hastert sat in his wheelchair without expression, glasses low on his nose. At one point, as Durkin made it clear that probation was not in the cards, Hastert clasped his hands in front of his face and dropped his eyes.
He showed no outward reaction to the sentence. As the dozens of spectators filed from the courtroom, Hastert remained motionless with his mouth downturned, not speaking to anyone.
Shortly before learning his sentence, Hastert had admitted for the first time that he sexually abused boys decades ago when he was the wrestling coach for Yorkville High School.
Hastert, who has been hobbled by a stroke and other health issues, quivered as he was helped from his wheelchair by his attorneys and leaned heavily on a walker as he approached the lectern at the front of the courtroom. In a raspy but firm voice, Hastert apologized to those he victimized, saying he "mistreated athletes."
"What I did was wrong and I regret it," Hastert said. "They looked to me, and I took advantage of them."
Durkin then asked directly if Hastert sexually abused certain victims. Hastert said he did not recall molesting Scott Cross, who moments earlier had testified that Hastert performed a sex act on him in an empty locker room when he was 17. "But I accept his statement," Hastert said.
Asked by the judge about another alleged victim, Stephen Reinboldt, Hastert called it "a different situation," but he said he was not denying the testimony of Reinboldt's sister, Jolene Burdge, who had testified about the abuse moments earlier.
"So you did sexually abuse him?" the judge asked.
"Yes," Hastert said.
The sentencing hearing completed the stunning downfall of Hastert, who rose from humble beginnings as a schoolteacher and coach to become the third-highest elected leader in the country, a man who was revered in the small towns of Kendall County he called home.
That legacy was shattered in May 2015 when federal prosecutors brought the stunning charges that Hastert had illegally withdrawn $1.7 million in hush money from various bank accounts to keep a former acquaintance quiet about "misconduct" in his past.
But it wasn't until earlier this month that prosecutors detailed in a 26-page sentencing filing that Hastert had abused at least five teenage students connected to the Yorkville wrestling team in the 1960s and 1970s.
One of them was Scott Cross. On Wednesday, an emotional Cross, 53, a younger brother of former Illinois House Republican leader Tom Cross, said he decided to go public so that his children and others would know there's an alternative to staying silent. As painful as his decision was, he said, "staying silent was worse."
Scott Cross' brother, a former Kendall County lawmaker who considered Hastert a political mentor, accompanied his brother to the sentencing.
Hastert, 74, is expected to surrender to a medical facility in the federal penitentiary system at an undetermined date.
Hastert's defense had sought a sentence of probation, a punishment Durkin said would not be appropriate in a case of this magnitude.
In lengthy remarks, the judge made much of the fact that when the FBI confronted Hastert about hundreds of thousands of cash withdrawals from banks, he tried to blame another sex abuse victim, identified only as Individual A, claiming he was blackmailing him.
"That's a big problem for you," Durkin said.
Prosecutors said in court that Individual A did not commit any crimes, and a lawsuit by Individual A said Hastert offered to pay $3.5 million for restitution and to keep the sexual abuse a secret.
The judge spent several minutes speaking about Hastert's victims, praising Cross' "incredible courage" for testifying Wednesday.
"He didn't have to do that," Durkin said.
The judge, also singled out Burdge, who had testified that her brother had told her of Hastert's sex abuse before his death in 1995.
Durkin told Burdge she could rest assured that people finally believed her.
Burdge nodded, smiled sadly in the courtroom gallery and whispered, "Thank you."
Individual A, whom Hastert paid $1.7 million to keep quiet, did not appear in court but delivered a written statement for the judge to consider. In the statement, Individual A said the sexual abuse had started with a massage, a similar account to other victims'.
Individual A was then 14, the judge noted.
"Can you imagine the whispering and the finger-pointing," the judge said, if there were rumors of "the town hero molesting you?"
About 30 minutes after the two-hour hearing ended, Hastert exited the courthouse being pushed in his wheelchair and passed a throng of media assembled on South Dearborn Street. The former speaker looked straight ahead and did not acknowledge questions that were shouted at him by reporters as he was helped into a black SUV.
Speaking to reporters in the courthouse lobby, U.S. Attorney Zachary Fardon said he was satisfied with the sentence but wished Hastert would have been held responsible for the sexual abuse when it happened decades ago.
"I am frustrated," Fardon said. "I wish Mr. Hastert would have been called to the carpet in 1968. We all would have been better off today. This isn't perfect, but it's what we got."
Fardon also said the witnesses who decided to come forward and testify about the abuse deserve the credit, particularly Scott Cross.
"We saw some extraordinary courage in the courtroom today," Fardon said. "After decades of unfathomable silence, he stood up and spoke the truth about his coach. That was courageous, that was important, that was selfless, and I am in awe of it."
Fardon also said he hoped their example would encourage any other potential victims of Hastert's misconduct to come forward.
Hastert's lies about his withdrawal of money had sent the FBI on a "harmful wild goose chase" that had Individual A as its target, the judge said, calling the former speaker's conduct "unconscionable."
Still, the judge noted, "I can't sentence you for being a child molester," pointing out that the statute of limitations had long passed.
While Durkin said he was taking Hastert's age and health into account, he noted that much of the former speaker's lying had taken place after he turned 70. More than 4,600 inmates in federal prisons are older than 65, the judge noted.
Still, he said he did not intend for Hastert's punishment to be "a death sentence."
He agreed Hastert should turn himself in at a later date when a federal medical facility in the prison system can accept him.
In his testimony, Cross said his family moved to suburban Yorkville as a 10-year-old and that he looked up to Hastert, a renowned wrestling coach who invited him to wrestling camps in Virginia and Colorado.
Hastert was "a key figure in my life as a coach and a teacher," said Cross, who lives in the west suburbs.
Cross said the alleged abuse took place on one occasion when Cross was alone with Hastert in a wrestling room.
"He told me he could help me lose weight by giving me a massage," he testified. "I trusted what he was saying and took him at his word."
His voice shaking, Cross said Hastert told him to lie face down. The massage started, but after a few minutes, Hastert asked him to roll over.
Hastert then grabbed his penis and began rubbing it, Cross said.
"I was stunned by what he was doing -- I jumped up," he said.
Cross also told the courtroom about the reclining chair Hastert allegedly put up near the boys shower, saying he came to accept it because he trusted Hastert. Years later he felt pain and guilt and sought professional help. He just told his parents last year of the abuse, Cross said.
On Wednesday, Cross' brother, a longtime former state legislator, released a statement on behalf of the family.
"We are very proud of Scott for having the courage to relive this very painful part of his life in order to ensure that justice is done today," the statement said. "We hope his testimony will provide courage and strength to other victims of other cases of abuse to speak out and advocate for themselves. With his testimony concluded, we ask now that you respect Scott's privacy and that of our family."
Prosecutors had first called Burdge to testify. She read a letter her brother wrote five months before he died, describing his last painful days.
When her brother died of AIDS in 1995, Burdge said she was determined to confront Hastert "and hold you accountable for sexually abusing my brother.
"I knew your secret, and you couldn't bribe or intimidate your way out," she told Hastert in the courtroom.
She criticized Hastert for not being truthful about what happened.
"You think you can deny your abuse of Steve because he can no longer speak for himself -- that's why I'm here," she said.
Burdge urged Hastert to show the honor, integrity and decency all his supporters say he has. The abuse led her brother down a dark path, she said.
"You were supposed to keep him safe, not violate him," she said.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven Block told the judge that Hastert's attempts to keep his secret safe continued to this day, noting Hastert falsely accused Individual A of extorting him last year.
Hastert could have come up with any reason for having to withdraw the money at the center of the indictment but instead tried to put a criminal case on Individual A even though he "had committed no crime," the prosecutor said.
Hastert tried whatever he could to keep his secret, Block said.
"He has failed," Block said. "This process has shined a light on the defendant's history of sexual abuse and his attempts to cover it up."
Hastert's lead lawyer, Thomas Green of Washington, asked the judge to consider the entire arc of Hastert's life in fashioning his sentence.
"Nothing I say this morning ... should be interpreted or received by anyone as an attempt to minimize the emotional trauma and lasting injury" inflicted by Hastert about 40 years ago, he said. "We acknowledge and respect what we have heard here this morning."
Hastert made "poor decisions" after being confronted by the FBI about his past, Green said, retreating to "survival instinct" after being approached by federal agents. He couldn't admit his past wrongdoing to himself, let alone to a federal agent, Green said.
"He did not know the truth," the attorney said.
Some of that lingers today, said Green, pointing out that Hastert approached Tom Cross for a letter of support at sentencing even though Cross' brother was one of the abuse victims.
As his lawyer spoke, Hastert hung his head, his eyes gazing toward the floor as Green described how all his good works have been eclipsed by his misdeeds decades ago.
Hastert has seen his name removed from public buildings and his portrait at the Capitol sent to storage. Many letters of support for him have been withdrawn as the case progressed, according to his lawyer.
"This is one of the most sad and tragic cases I have ever encountered," Green said. Hastert's life has been forever compromised "in every way possible," he said.
He sits at home alone in a wheelchair, unable to take care of himself and "isolated from society," Green said.
"I do not believe that more is necessary," Green said in asking for probation for Hastert.
It's been six months since Hastert pleaded guilty in the case that saw him pay $1.7 million in hush money to cover up wrongdoing from his days as a teacher and wrestling coach decades earlier.
In that time, the man who was once the third-highest ranking elected official in the country has seen the salacious secrets of his past spread around the globe as federal prosecutors alleged he sexually abused at least five teen boys connected to the Yorkville High School wrestling team.
He's seen his legacy as the longest-running Republican House speaker in history left in tatters, suffered a near-fatal blood infection that left him hospitalized for more than a month and even been sued by a man who says he still owes more than half of the $3.5 million he'd agreed to pay to keep it all secret.
The case against Hastert began to unfold four years ago after a bank in Yorkville noticed numerous $50,000 cash withdrawals by him between June 2010 and April 2012, according to prosecutors.
When a bank official contacted Hastert to ask about the withdrawals, the former lawmaker said it was none of his business, but when he was pressed, he claimed in part that he was withdrawing the cash to buy stocks. After that, Hastert began to withdraw cash in increments of less than $10,000, leading the Yorkville bank to close his account because of his suspicious activity, prosecutors said.
By early 2013, federal law enforcement officials learned of Hastert's withdrawals of large sums of cash at the Yorkville bank and two other banks.
It wasn't until late 2014 that authorities decided to interview Hastert about what turned out to be his withdrawal of $1.7 million over the previous 4 1/2 years. Hastert claimed he didn't trust banks and wanted his cash "in a safe place," according to prosecutors.
Shortly after that interview, lawyers for Hastert told authorities that the former House speaker was a victim of an extortion plot and would cooperate in an investigation. Hastert claimed that Individual A had falsely accused him of inappropriately touching him decades ago when he was coach, according to prosecutors.
At the request of authorities in March 2015, Hastert secretly recorded two calls to Individual A to try to catch him making extortionist threats, but agents soon realized it was Hastert who appeared to be lying. Authorities then decided to question Individual A, who told them about the alleged abuse. He said Hastert had him stay in a motel room overnight with him while returning from a wrestling camp. Individual A had complained about a groin pull, so Hastert said he wanted to check it out and began massaging his groin area after telling him to remove his underwear, prosecutors said.
In a bombshell sentencing memo detailing the sex abuse allegations, prosecutors said Hastert's life was "marred by stunning hypocrisy," noting that in his memoir, the former House speaker reflected on his career as a wrestling coach, writing that there was "never a sufficient reason to strip away a person's dignity."
"Yet that is exactly what he did to his victims," prosecutors wrote. "He made them feel alone, ashamed, guilty and devoid of dignity. While (Hastert) achieved great success, reaping all the benefits that went with it, these boys struggled, and all are still struggling now with what (he) did to them."
Hastert's lawyers, meanwhile, sought probation for the former lawmaker. Their sentencing filing said Hastert was "profoundly sorry" for the harm he caused others decades ago but stopped short of acknowledging accusations he sexually abused students. In fact, his lawyers singled out his teaching and coaching background for praise, saying he chose that career path "to make a difference in the lives of young people."
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