Mistrial called in case of ex-AT&T exec accused of bribing Madigan — weeks before former speaker's trial

This hasn’t been the easiest year for federal prosecutors in Chicago, and things didn’t get any better Thursday when a jury failed to agree on whether a former AT&T Illinois executive bribed ex-state House Speaker Michael J. Madigan to pass legislation in Springfield.

Jurors considering the case against Paul La Schiazza deliberated for 14 ½ hours over three days. But around 10:15 a.m. Thursday — 10 hours into deliberations — the panel warned of a “stalemate” in a note to U.S. District Judge Robert Gettleman.

The judge asked them to keep trying. But at 2:15 p.m., they sent him another note: “We believe there is no possibility of coming to a unanimous verdict.” Gettleman called the panel into the courtroom and asked the foreperson, “Are you absolutely sure about this?”

“I am absolutely positive,” she assured him.

With that, Gettleman discharged the jury and declared a mistrial. He told attorneys to return Tuesday to help determine when — and if — La Schiazza should be retried. The former AT&T executive is not in the clear, with jurors unable to either convict or acquit him.

Prosecutors say La Schiazza bribed Madigan in 2017 by paying $22,500 to former state Rep. Edward “Eddie” Acevedo. The claim also looms in Madigan’s own trial, set to begin in less than three weeks. The once-powerful Southwest Side Democrat faces a sweeping racketeering conspiracy indictment that includes the alleged scheme involving La Schiazza and others.

But Thursday’s hung jury amounts to another setback for federal prosecutors, just as they’re heading into the biggest Chicago corruption trial since the days of Rod Blagojevich.

“We are pleased with the jury’s result and appreciative of all of their hard work,” defense attorney Tinos Diamantatos told the Chicago Sun-Times as he left the courthouse Thursday. “And we will continue to fight hard to exonerate our client, Mr. Paul La Schiazza.”

Prosecutors didn't comment.

The feds secured convictions in 2023 against nine people in five trials resulting from public corruption investigations. However, momentum seemed to shift in December when the U.S. Supreme Court decided to take up a northwest Indiana corruption case. It raised questions about a key bribery law employed by prosecutors, including against Madigan.

That led to a six-month delay in Madigan’s trial, which had earlier been set for April. In June, the high court ruled the bribery law in question does not also criminalize after-the-fact rewards known as “gratuities.”

Madigan has used the decision to challenge his indictment, and a ruling is expected shortly. Meanwhile, defense attorneys are also challenging the related convictions of four former political insiders found guilty in May 2023 of scheming to bribe Madigan to benefit ComEd.

Separately, a judge this summer handed a relatively light two-year prison sentence to former Ald. Edward M. Burke following his racketeering conviction in December — after prosecutors asked for a decade. And just last month, another jury acquitted an Indiana businessman the feds had accused of bribing Cook County assessor’s office employees.

None of that puts Madigan in the clear. But it’s a remarkable turn of events after public corruption jurors sided almost entirely with prosecutors in 2023.

Jurors in the La Schiazza trial seemed initially to focus on whether any evidence proved that La Schiazza intended to exchange Acevedo’s money for passage of a key bill affecting AT&T. They sent the judge a note on the topic early on their first full day of deliberations.

Prosecutors had built the case largely out of emails gathered from AT&T, as well as testimony from longtime AT&T lobbyist Stephen Selcke. Tom Cullen, a Springfield veteran who also turned to lobbying after working for Madigan, provided additional key testimony.

Jurors heard from more than a dozen witnesses over four days. Then they listened to three hours of closing arguments in which prosecutors aimed to put all the pieces together.

The key players in the scheme involved Michael McClain, Madigan’s longtime friend who was widely seen as Madigan’s messenger in Springfield, and Acevedo, who became a member of Madigan’s leadership team during his 20 years in the Legislature.

McClain is among those already convicted for a separate bribery scheme aimed at Madigan, and he faces trial again alongside Madigan next month. Acevedo served a six-month prison sentence in 2022 for tax evasion.

At the heart of the La Schiazza case was legislation meant to help end AT&T Illinois’ costly obligation to provide landline telephone service to all Illinois residents. It was known as its Carrier of Last Resort, or COLR, bill.

Prosecutors claim Madigan wanted to help Acevedo because of the increasing Latino population in Madigan’s district.

McClain reached out to AT&T Illinois looking for a small contract for Acevedo in February 2017. Then, two days later, McClain told La Schiazza that Madigan had assigned McClain to the COLR legislation as a “special project,” emails showed.

The contract for Acevedo suddenly became an urgent issue for La Schiazza more than a month later, on March 28, 2017, when he told his team he “got a call” and wanted them to “move quickly” on Acevedo’s contract.

Thing is, no one at AT&T Illinois was particularly impressed with Acevedo. The longtime lawmaker had a bad reputation, and Republicans threatened to vote against AT&T’s agenda if Acevedo wound up on the utility’s payroll.

So the utility wound up funneling Acevedo’s money through Cullen’s firm. La Schiazza told his staff he had no objection to the arrangement, “as long as you are sure we will get credit and the box checked, and of course we have legal approval to engage Eddie this way.”

The COLR bill became law after the state House and Senate voted around July 1, 2017, to override a veto from then-Gov. Bruce Rauner. Madigan voted in favor of the bill and to override the veto.

Less than two weeks later, on July 12, 2017, La Schiazza was asked by Madigan’s son, Andrew Madigan, to sponsor a nonprofit event “at the suggestion of our good friend Mike McClain.” La Schiazza griped by email to a colleague that “this will be endless.”

He later added, “we are on the friends and family plan now.”

Assistant U.S. Attorney Sushma Raju argued Tuesday that La Schiazza’s comments proved the exchange of Acevedo’s job for passage of the COLR bill. Raju called the emails an “after-the-fact discussion of what [La Schiazza] did and why he did it.”

“It’s not building goodwill,” Raju said. “It’s not just kissing up to [Michael] Madigan. These are acknowledgments that [La Schiazza] and AT&T were of the mindset that they needed to bribe Madigan to move the COLR bill forward.”

Contributing: Kade Heather and Kaitlin Washburn