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What to Look For in Wednesday’s Sentencing of Dennis Hastert Dennis Hastert’s Former Wrestling Student Recounts Abuse
(about 2 hours later)
CHICAGO — J. Dennis Hastert, whose fall from genial retired speaker of the House and successful lobbyist to convicted felon has been sudden and steep, appeared in federal court here on Wednesday to learn his sentence. CHICAGO — A man who was once a member of a high school wrestling team coached by J. Dennis Hastert stood in a courtroom near Mr. Hastert on Wednesday and spoke tearfully of being sexually abused as he lay on a locker room training table decades ago.
Arriving before 7 a.m. local time, Mr. Hastert entered the courthouse in a wheelchair. The sentencing is scheduled for 10 a.m. “As a high school wrestler I looked up to Coach Hastert — he was a key figure in my life,” the former wrestler, now a 53-year-old businessman in Chicago, told a judge. “I felt intense pain, shame and guilt,” the former wrestler said, stopping once to compose himself, and adding that he had gone years without speaking of what had happened.
A former wrestling student whom Mr. Hastert once coached and the sister of another former wrestling team member are expected to testify against Mr. Hastert before the sentence is announced. Here is a breakdown of the case and proceedings: He said the experience had caused him lifelong trauma. “I’ve always felt that what Coach Hastert had done to me was my darkest secret,” he said, as Mr. Hastert sat in a wheelchair nearby.
Mr. Hastert has pleaded guilty to knowingly structuring bank transactions to avoid reporting rules as part of what prosecutors say was an effort to cover up sexual abuse of members of the high school wrestling team he coached decades ago. Mr. Hastert, 74, has acknowledged that he had promised to quietly pay $3.5 million to one former wrestling student for misconduct he committed years ago. The man, known in court documents as Individual D, is one of at least four former wrestling team members who prosecutors say have described being molested by Mr. Hastert, 74, who was awaiting sentencing here on Wednesday for a federal crime linked to the alleged abuse.
Mr. Hastert, who built his political career in the Republican Party on his success as a small-town wrestling coach in the 1960s, ’70s and early ’80s, was not charged with sexual wrongdoing, acts for which the statutes of limitation have run out. Mr. Hastert, who made an unlikely rise from small town wrestling coach to become the speaker of the House, has pleaded guilty to illegally structuring bank transactions as part of what prosecutors say was an effort to cover up a pattern of abuse against young members of his wrestling team.
Federal prosecutors, who reached a plea deal with Mr. Hastert last year, have called for a sentence that falls within federal sentencing guidelines on the felony count. The maximum sentence for the count is five years in prison, but under an estimate of federal guidelines in the case, he could receive as little as no prison time or, perhaps, six months behind bars. Lawyers for Mr. Hastert, who say he has had a series of medical problems in recent months and now uses a wheelchair, are seeking probation. The felony count to which Mr. Hastert pleaded guilty carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison. Mr. Hastert’s defense team has requested probation, citing his years of public service and his failing health as reasons not to send him to prison. In recent months, Mr. Hastert has suffered a stroke, a blood stream infection and a spinal infection — conditions his lawyers say have left him in need of round-the-clock care.
Yet, Judge Thomas M. Durkin of Federal District Court has made it clear that he also intends to consider a recent revelation in the case as he decides Mr. Hastert’s punishment: that when confronted with a string of large withdrawals from his bank, a representative for Mr. Hastert indicated to the federal authorities in 2015 that the former congressman was being extorted over a false claim of sexual abuse — a scenario that the authorities later found to be untrue. Under an agreement with the authorities at the time, court documents show, Mr. Hastert had been required to tell the truth. As part of a plea deal, prosecutors have said they would support a sentence of six months or less.
“That’s an aggravating factor in my mind,” Judge Durkin said during a hearing this month. Mr. Hastert’s fall from genial retired House speaker and hometown celebrity on the far edge of Chicago’s western suburbs was sudden and steep.
Prosecutors have described at least four former wrestling team members who say Mr. Hastert committed sex acts on them, including one, known in court documents only as Individual A, who began receiving the payments from Mr. Hastert after 2010. For decades, both in Washington and in Yorkville, where Mr. Hastert had coached the local high school wrestling team to state championship, he had a reputation for appearing down-to-earth and steady — with little hint of scandal.
A fifth former wrestling student says that he was offered a massage, and that Mr. Hastert “brushed his hand” against the former student’s genitals, though the former student told prosecutors he was unsure whether it was on purpose. Mr. Hastert, who was first elected to Congress in 1986, found himself catapulted to speaker in 1999, in part, because he seemed to be a safe, agreeable option: The Republicans’ first choice, Robert L. Livingston of Louisiana, stepped away from the post even before he took it, acknowledging adulterous affairs in his past.
Individual A, who filed suit this week accusing Mr. Hastert of breach of contract for failing to pay the full $3.5 million, is not expected to appear at Mr. Hastert’s sentencing. Mr. Hastert grew up delivering feed for his family’s farm supply business, and held onto his plain-speaking style long after he left teaching and coaching for a life in the state legislature in Illinois and then in Washington, before he became a high-paid lobbyist. “I’ve always thought of myself as a kid from the cornfields,” Mr. Hastert wrote in his 2004 memoir, “Speaker: Lessons from Forty Years in Coaching and Politics.”
But another of Mr. Hastert’s former wrestlers, known in court papers as Individual D, will appear, prosecutors have said. Individual D has told prosecutors that Mr. Hastert approached him when he was 17 and a wrestler at Yorkville High School, on the edge of Chicago’s western suburbs. Mr. Hastert never appeared to shy away from the wrestling world he had built in the 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s as a coach at Yorkville High School, continuing to advocate for the sport in Congress and to hire former student wrestlers as his aides and advisers.
Individual D has said he was staying late after practice one day, trying to make weight, when Mr. Hastert said that a massage could “take some pounds off.” Mr. Hastert then performed a sex act on Individual D, a prosecution memo says, and never again spoke of it to Individual D. Yet it was a former student wrestler, prosecutors say, who eventually would lead to Mr. Hastert’s downfall after a series of revelations that left many — even Mr. Hastert’s onetime assistant wrestling coach — stunned. Some wondered how the allegations could be kept secret in such a small town for so long.
Mr. Hastert’s lawyers have said that he does not contest the allegations of Individual D, but that “in all candor he has no current recollection of the episode.” More broadly, Mr. Hastert’s lawyers have offered an apology on their client’s behalf, saying he “is deeply sorry and apologizes for his misconduct that occurred decades ago and the resulting harm he caused to others.” Mr. Hastert was charged in May with lying to the F.B.I. and making cash withdrawals in a way designed to hide the fact that he was paying $3.5 million to a former wrestler for misconduct from years earlier. The former wrestler and family friend of Mr. Hastert, identified in documents as Individual A, told of abuse in a motel room during a wrestling camp trip when he was 14.
The defense lawyers have provided the judge with more than 40 letters in support of Mr. Hastert, including from his wife, Jean; Tom DeLay, the former House majority leader; and an array of former political leaders and consultants, wrestling coaches, wrestlers, lawyers, former law enforcement officers and friends. Prosecutors said Individual A approached Mr. Hastert to talk about the incident years later, in about 2010, asking Mr. Hastert whether there had been other victims and whether he would pay Individual A for what he had done.
“By any measure, appearing before this court to receive its sentence will be the most difficult day in Mr. Hastert’s life,” the defense lawyers wrote in a memo to the judge. “Mr. Hastert’s fall from grace has been swift and devastating.” After the payments began, federal authorities took notice of large, unexplained withdrawals Mr. Hastert was making from his bank. When told that large withdrawals had to be reported, Mr. Hastert began drawing smaller sums, prosecutors say, to avoid notice.
Jolene Burdge, the sister of Stephen Reinboldt, another member of the wrestling team, is also expected to testify on Wednesday. Mr. Reinboldt died in 1995, but had told his sister that his first same-sex experience had been with Mr. Hastert, and that he had been abused all through high school. Federal investigators approached Mr. Hastert in late 2014, inquiring about the many withdrawals — he had paid Individual A some $1.7 million by then — and Mr. Hastert said he simply did not trust banks and was keeping the money in a safe place. Not long after, Mr. Hastert’s lawyer contacted officials with a different story, prosecutors say: Mr. Hastert was the victim of extortion by Individual A for false molestation accusations, the lawyer said.
Prosecutors have argued that a sentence for Mr. Hastert must balance his years of public service with a need to “avoid a public perception that the powerful are treated differently than ordinary citizens when facing sentencing for a serious crime.” But after recording conversations between Mr. Hastert and Individual A, the authorities concluded that there was no extortion. They found that Individual A had wanted to bring lawyers in to negotiate a formal settlement with Mr. Hastert, but that he had declined to involve anyone else.
Mr. Hastert, known admiringly in Washington and back in Yorkville as “Coach,” reached wide acclaim as an unlikely, down-to-earth former teacher who had reached remarkable success through compromise and listening. Prosecutors say Individual A was not the only student molested. At least three other men — all former members of the team, as young as 14 — said they, too, had been abused. The acts included “touching of minors’ groin area and genitals or oral sex with a minor,” prosecutors said. One man, Stephen Reinboldt, told his sister, Jolene Burdge, of repeated incidents of abuse, all through high school; he died in 1995.
Mr. Hastert’s history, the prosecutors have written, is “marred by stunning hypocrisy,” noting that “while the defendant achieved great success, reaping all the benefits that went with it, these boys struggled, and all are still struggling now with what defendant did to them.” Mr. Hastert has not been charged with sexual abuse, and prosecutors said the reported incidents were beyond the statutes of limitation. Still, Mr. Hastert’s lawyers have said he was “deeply sorry and apologizes for his misconduct that occurred decades ago and the resulting harm he caused to others.”
In the case of at least one former wrestler, Individual D, Mr. Hastert’s lawyers have said he does not contest the allegations of Individual D, but that “in all candor he has no current recollection of the episode.”
A long list of supporters — from Mr. Hastert’s wife Jean to Tom DeLay, the former House majority leader — sent letters of support for Mr. Hastert to Judge Durkin, who is the brother of a Republican state lawmaker in Illinois. “He doesn’t deserve what he is going through,” Mr. DeLay wrote.
Other supporters included wrestling coaches, lawyers, former students and former law enforcement officials. Mr. Hastert’s brother, Dave, wrote that he feared Mr. Hastert would fall into depression, given his circumstances and the physical ailments that have left him in a wheelchair. “If it were me, I’d be wheeling that chair to the highway, and waiting for a semi,” his brother wrote.
“By any measure, appearing before this court to receive its sentence will be the most difficult day in Mr. Hastert’s life,” his lawyers wrote in a memo to the judge. “Mr. Hastert’s fall from grace has been swift and devastating.”
Prosecutors have argued that a sentence for Mr. Hastert must balance Mr. Hastert’s years of public service with a need to “avoid a public perception that the powerful are treated differently than ordinary citizens when facing sentencing for a serious crime.”
Mr. Hastert’s history, the prosecutors have written, is “marred by stunning hypocrisy.”
“While the defendant achieved great success, reaping all the benefits that went with it,’ they wrote, “these boys struggled, and all are still struggling now with what defendant did to them.”