Hastert to Appear in Court June 4

Former Congressman and Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert is scheduled to appear in court at 10 a.m. Thursday, June 4 according to the United States District Court for Northern Illinois.

Hastert will be arraigned on charges of lying to the FBI and evading federal rules governing bank transactions.

According to a federal indictment released Thursday, May 28, Hastert withdrew $1.7 million from several banks between 2010 to 2014 and gave the cash to a person identified as “Individual A” by the U.S. Attorney’s Office. Hastert took the money out of the banks in amounts less than $10,000 to conceal the transactions from bank regulators and avoid the required “currency transaction reports.”

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Hastert, 73, of Plano, told the FBI in December the cash was for himself, but prosecutors allege Hastert paid off someone “to compensate for and conceal his prior misconduct.”

Federal authorities have not disclosed what that “prior misconduct” might be that required the hefty “hush money” payoffs.

The indictment alleges that Hastert promised this person more than $3 million to compensate for his “misconduct.” Individual A is a resident of Yorkville and has known Hastert for most of A’s life, according to the indictment.

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