THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 22, 2007
NEWS
9A
COURTS
Conviction of former Illinois governor upheld Political scandal biggest in decades
BY MIKE ROBINSON
ASSOCIATED PRESS
CHICAGO — A federal appeals court upheld former Gov. George
kryan's racketeering and fraud conviction Tuesday and refused to grant a new trial that could delay his 6½-year prison sentence in the biggest political
Ryan
scandal to rock Illinois in decades.
Ryan's attorneys immediately began trying to prevent the 73-year-old former governor, once the state's most powerful Republican, from having to report to prison immediately.
7. Tuesday afternoon, they were fil
ing for a lucky "granted "en banc" hearing that would have the entire U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals hear the appeal, said longtime Ryan supporter James R. Thompson, another former Illinois governor whose law firm,
Winston and Strawn, represented Ryan for free. A three-judge panel had issued the split ruling rejecting a new trial.
"He can still appeal things, but even with those appeals pending, by court order, he has to report."
Ryan was convicted last year of racketeering conspiracy, fraud and other offenses for taking payoffs from political insiders in exchange for state business while he was Illinois secretary of state from 1991 to 1999 and governor for four years after that. Prosecutors said he had steered state contracts and leases to insiders and used tax dollars in his political campaigns.
"Governor Ryan obviously is disappointed," Thompson said. But he said, "No court ever deprived a defendant of his life and liberty under these circumstances and that is an argument we will make if necessary to the U.S. Supreme Court."
The three-judge 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel disagreed Tuesday in a 2-1 decision.
In his appeal, Ryan's attorneys argued that the jury's deliberations were flawed.
U. S. District Judge Rebecca R. Pallmeyer had replaced two jurors with alternates after deliberations in the case had already started, and the defense said unauthorized documents brought into the jury room poisoned the deliberations.
Judge Michael Kanne dissented and said Ryan and his co-defendant, businessman-lobbyist Larry Warner, should get a new trial. He called the jury deliberations "dysfunctional."
"The fact that the trial may not have been picture perfect is, in itself, nothing unusual," Judge Diane Wood wrote in the majority opinion, joined by Judge Daniel Manion.
PATRICK M. COLLINS Former federal prosecutor
FIRE
It wasn't immediately clear when Ryan would have to begin serving his 6½-year sentence. He has been free on an unusual appeal bond granted by the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The court had said
Soldier returns from Iraq after daughter is killed
FORT RILEY — A soldier serving in Iraq was returning to Fort Riley after his 9-year-old daughter died in a fire at his family's apartment.
The girl's mother and three younger siblings — ages 5, 6 and 16 months — escaped the fire, which was reported about midnight Monday at the Colyer Manor East.
No names were released and the cause of the fire was under investigation, officials said Tuesday.
Ryan and Warner both maintain they did nothing illegal.
then that he would have to report within 72 hours unless granted a new trial, said former federal prosecutor Patrick M. Collins, who spearheaded the corruption investigation.
The investigation into the men began as a probe of bribes exchanged for commercial drivers licenses in Illinois. It ballooned into a wide-ranging investigation of corruption when Ryan was a major political power at the Statehouse in Springfield and led to dozens of convictions of state officials, lobbyists, driving instructors and others.
"He can still appeal things, but even with those appeals pending, by court order, he has to report," Collins said.
"Our main effort and our main focus right now is on that mother and her three children ... and also bringing that service member back from Iraq so that he can link up with his family members." Fort Riley Garrison Commander Col. Richard
Piscal said.
The girl's father is a member of the 1st Battalion, 28th Infantry Regiment, 4th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division.
Crews from the Fort Riley Fire Department responded to the fire after neighbors called it in, said Chris Ferris, Fort Riley's director of emergency services. The girl was pronounced dead shortly after arriving at Irwin Army Community Hospital.
The seven remaining apartments were structurally safe, said Brian Beauregard, Picerne Military Housing program director.
The Colyer Manor homes are among the first that Picerne Military Housing plans to demolish as part of new development of onpost housing.
Associated Press
Greenvor Bull/ASSOCIATED PRESS
> NATURAL DISASTER
Hurricane terrorizes Mexico
Fisherman work to remove a boat from the waters in front of Campeche, Mexico, in the Vicente Peninsula Tues. Aug 21 as Hurricane Dean nears. Dean crashed into the Caribbean coast of Mexico on Tuesday as the strongest stormic to hit land in the Atlantic region since 1988.
"We often see that when a storm weakens, people let down their guard completely. You shouldn't do that," said Jamie Rhome, a hurricane specialist. "This storm probably won't become a Category 5 again, but it will still be powerful."
Tropical storm reaches gusts of 200 mph, Government enforces curfews
BY MARK STEVENSON ASSOCIATED PRESS
It weakened to a Category 1 storm, with maximum sustained winds of 85 mph, but was expected to grow back into a powerful hurricane as it drew fuel from the warm waters of the lower Gulf of Mexico. More than 100 offshore oil platforms were evacuated ahead of the storm.
FELIPE CARRILLO PUERTO,
Mexico — Hurricane Dean
slammed into the Caribbean coast
of Mexico on Tuesday as a roaring
Category 5 hurricane, the most
intense Atlantic storm to make
landfall in two decades. It lashed
remote Mayan villages as it raced
across the Yucatan Peninsula to the
heart of Mexico's oil industry.
When Dean first struck land near the cruise port of Majahual, it had gusts that reached 200 mph It had an expected storm surge of 12
Dean's path was a stroke of luck for Mexico. After killing 13 people in the Caribbean, it made land fall along a sparsely populated coastline, south of the major resorts where 50,000 tourists had been evacuated.
President Felipe Calderon met with President Bush and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper Bush offered U.S. assistance and expressed his concern for the citizens of Mexico and elsewhere whose lives were effected.
"We stand ready to help," Bush said with Calderon at his side. "The American people care a lot about the human condition in our neighborhood and when we see human suffering we want to do what we can."
unknown.
Some of the storm's strongest winds raked the state capital of Chetumal, where residents were ordered to stay home until 10 a.m. Tuesday Sirens wailed constantly as the storm battered the city for hours, hurling billboards down streets. All electricity was down.
BY PATRICK CONDON ASSOCIATED PRESS
With the storm still screaming, there were no immediate reports of deaths, injuries or major damage. Soldiers evacuated more than 250 small communities. Some turned away soldiers with machetes and refused to leave or hid when the army evacuated the area, said Jorge Acevedo, a spokesman for the state of Quintana Roo. Their fate was
MINNEAPOLIS — With the search for bodies over at the site of the interstate bridge collapse, authorities will focus on removing tons of wreckage from the Mississippi River so a replacement bridge can be built over the next year.
to 18 feet above normal tides and dumped rain on low-lying areas where Mayan Indians live in stick huts in isolated communities.
Final body found at bridge site
President Bush on Tuesday approved an emergency declaration making the city and state eligible for more federal assistance for recovery.
The president's declaration also authorizes the Federal Emergency Management Agency to coordinate disaster relief efforts, according to a statement issued by the White House. Bush was scheduled to be in Minneapolis on Tuesday and to get a briefing on the bridge.
Gov. Tim Pawlenty said he requested the help because the emergency response alone cost more than $8 million.
The government evacuated Caye Caulker and Ambergris Caye and ordered a dusk-to-dawn curfew from Belize City north to the Mexican border.
》 NATIONAL
Divers on Monday evening discovered the body of the last known missing person: Gregory Jolstad,
a 45-year-old construction worker who was part of the crew resurfacing the Interstate 35W bridge when it fell Aug. 1 during the evening rush hour. The discovery brought the official death toll to 13.
"There aren't a lot of smiles here tonight," said Hennepin County Sheriff Rich Stanek, who was overseeing the search. He said recovery workers were relieved that all the people known to be missing had been found, but mindful of the loss to the families.
"We all have very heavy hearts",
he said.
Stanek didn't close the door on the possibility of more remains turning up amid the wreckage. He said teams from the sheriff's office would maintain a presence at the bridge site, but that Navy dive teams brought in to locate the remains would leave within the next day or so.
Jolstad's wife, Lisa Jolstad, had worried earlier Monday that the search for her husband's body would drag on, leaving her without a sense of closure. Stanek said he spoke to her after Greg
Jolstad's body was identified, and that she expressed thanks to the search team.
Department of Transportation, said crews would immediately begin heavy duty debris removal, clearing the tons of concrete and steel that crumpled into the river.
Gov. Tim Pawlenty on Monday asked President Bush to declare the collapse a major disaster, which would make the state eligible for more federal money. Bush was scheduled to be in Minneapolis on Tuesday and to get a briefing on the bridge.
"We're looking at hopefully having the south end of the bridge removed by the end of the week," Zoller said, adding that reopening the river channel to boats would also be a priority.
The search for bodies along the river prevented much other work from beginning. The only removal of bridge debris so far occurred when it was needed to let divers search inaccessible areas, and state transportation officials had vowed that no site work for the planned bridge replacement would start until all the bodies were found.
Terry Zoller, the incident commander at the site for the state
The department has set a goal of having a new interstate bridge ready for business by the end of 2008, and an agency official said recently the goal was attainable as long as building began before winter.
Stanek said officials would meet Tuesday to discuss when to reopen the 10th Avenue bridge, a smaller span parallel to the Interstate 35W bridge that has been closed since the collapse.
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