Meanwhile, back on the home front, the news of corruption and clout continues apace.
Last week, for starters, former Police Deputy Supt. William A. Hanhardt entered a guilty plea to federal charges that he headed the nation’s largest organized crime jewelry theft ring, playing, as it were, both sides of the fence.
For more than 15 years, the ring, aided by police databases, snatched more than $5 million in diamonds and gems by systematically stalking more than 100 salesmen. Although most of the thefts occurred after Hanhardt’s 1986 police retirement, evidence indicates that his corruption and mob ties while he was a cop go back to the 1950s.
Some good government types suggest that the guilty plea closes this sad chapter. It doesn’t. The unanswered questions are: How could someone, so widely suspected of mob ties, rise to rank of top detective? What is being done to sanitize the department?
And why so little public outrage? Compared with the old Summerdale police scandal of decades ago, which was petty ante in comparison, public apathy reigns. Cops filling their squads with TV sets as they did in the old Summerdale districts pales in comparison with the way that Hanhardt, and the people who promoted him, jobbed the public trust. Yet, the public outrage over Summerdale forced a vast reorganization of the Police Department. Maybe it’s these times. Lots of folks probably don’t even remember the Austin District scandal, a mere four years ago, when cops extorted money from drug dealers.
The net result of the Hanhardt scandal is the usual round of CYAs (cover your anatomies) among political creatures. Mayor Richard M. Daley proclaimed it didn’t happen on his watch. Look to Richard Brzeczek, Daley said, referring to a former superintendent under former Mayor Jane Byrne, which automatically made him Daley’s enemy. Brzeczek, in turn, referred to Daley’s former Police Supt. Matt Rodriguez, who resigned after reports of a long friendship with a convicted felon. Who, in turn, had been questioned about the unsolved 1987 hit of Amoco Oil Co. executive Charles Merriam.
Yet, no one seems interested in looking into possible mob influence in the Police Department. The City Council won’t, because trained seals don’t do investigations.
To be non-partisan, may I note: Republican Gov. George Ryan now is engaged in a blatant, public-be-damned (albeit legal) scheme to award his chief of staff, Robert Newtson, a cushy job, at taxpayers’ expense. Newtson will be in the market for a job because Ryan is not seeking re-election because of corruption in the secretary of state’s office under his leadership. But that’s another story.
Ryan got help muscling through Congress a juicy appropriation for up to $50 million to build the Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum in Springfield. Sounds like a fine idea, but U.S. Sen. Peter Fitzgerald (R-Ill.) led a brave campaign against it, predicting that Ryan would funnel some of the money to cronies. House Speaker Dennis Hastert, a suburban Republican, was cross with Fitzgerald for suggesting such a thing, and now it is Hastert who has been made to look the dolt by Ryan, by making Fitzgerald’s predictions come true. Not that Ryan cares.
What makes this story so extraordinary is not that Ryan wants to install an unqualified hack as head of the museum for purely political reasons, but that he is so open, so righteous about it. His audaciousness is so impressive, it brings to mind the late Mayor Richard J. Daley saying that if people didn’t like a father doing stuff for his sons they could kiss his mistletoe.
In these troubled times, such stories should give Chicagoans a sense of stability. Still the Clout Capital of the World; ain’t we proud.
You’d think we might catch a break from the boodlers and influence peddlers, if only out of a wartime sense of patriotic duty. Won’t happen. Instead, Chicago can fondly see itself as that gritty, toddling town of old. No longer afflicted with the smell of the old Union Stockyards, it can continue to revel in the stink of its corruption and greed. Just when we need it, along comes the news that we still are in the boodle playoffs. Through it all, Chicago still is Chicago.
They say that Sept. 11 has changed life as we know it forever. Not in these parts. Not in our lifetime.
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E-mail: dbyrne@interaccess.com
