Judge nixes delay in ex-Ald. Edward Burke sentencing, hearing to go forward Monday
Sentencing for former Chicago Ald. Edward Burke will go forward next week after a federal judge on Friday denied a last-ditch effort to postpone the hearing until after the U.S. Supreme Court rules in a bribery case that his lawyers say could affect his conviction.
In her order posted on the court docket Friday morning, U.S. District Judge Virginia Kendall said she agreed with prosecutors that the high court’s decision in the case of former Portage, Indiana Mayor James Snyder “will have little or no impact” on the sentence that Burke receives.
“The parties shall be prepared to proceed” with the hearing at 10 a.m. Monday, the judge wrote.
Burke, 80, the longtime leader of the powerful City Council Finance Committee, was convicted in December in a series of schemes to use his considerable City Hall clout to try and win business from developers for his private property tax law firm.
Among them were efforts to woo the New York-based developers of the massive, $600 million renovation of the Old Post Office, extorting the Texas owners of a Burger King who were seeking to renovate a restaurant in Burke’s 14th Ward, and intervening on behalf of Charles Cui, a developer in Portage Park who wanted help getting a pole sign approved for a new Binny’s Beverage Depot location.
Prosecutors have asked for 10 years in prison, saying Burke’s schemes, many of which were captured on undercover wiretapped recordings, show he was no novice when it came to graft, but a savvy and sophisticated professional when it came to identifying his marks.
Burke’s legal team, meanwhile, has asked for an alternative to prison such as home confinement, arguing he’s in ill health and that his lapses do not erase the life of a “fundamentally decent man” who did a lot of good for his city over a six-decade career.
The Supreme Court, meanwhile, is expected to issue its ruling in the Snyder case by the end of the month.
jmeisner@chicagotribune.com