Michael Madigan was still the most powerful politician in the state when two FBI agents went to Springfield in 2019 and asked his former chief of staff to sit down for coffee, according to a court filing unsealed Wednesday.
Two years later, a memo that the former Madigan staffer, Tim Mapes, wrote to himself about the unusual meeting was shown to him during questioning before a federal grand jury, where Mapes had been granted immunity in exchange for his sworn testimony about his former boss, the filing stated.
“This memo was the only document they showed (Mapes) to refresh his admittedly ‘foggy’ memory of events, and it did the trick,” Mapes’ lawyers wrote in a motion to dismiss made public in U.S. District Court. “Mr. Mapes remembered the meeting after being shown the document.”
What Mapes discussed with the FBI was not revealed, but the conversation was among several new details included in the motion asking U.S. District Judge John Lee to dismiss large portions of the obstruction of justice indictment against Mapes.
The 11-page indictment alleged Mapes repeatedly lied during a March 31, 2021, appearance before the grand jury when asked about Madigan’s relationship with his longtime confidant Michael McClain, who was charged in 2020 with orchestrating a bribery scheme by Commonwealth Edison to shower money on Madigan’s associates in exchange for the speaker’s help with legislation in Springfield.
Mapes also lied when he said he had no knowledge that McClain had communicated with two unnamed state representatives in 2018 on Madigan’s behalf, the indictment alleged. The Tribune reported they are Rep. Bob Rita of Blue Island and former Rep. Lou Lang of Skokie.
Mapes is one of the closest advisers from Madigan’s extremely small circle of trusted associates to face federal charges. He has denied wrongdoing and maintained that federal authorities are attempting to squeeze him to give up incriminating information on Madigan.
His indictment in May 2021 caught many by surprise, particularly since he was granted immunity from prosecution by the U.S. attorney’s office and warned by the chief judge before his testimony before the grand jury that failing to answer truthfully could result in criminal charges against him.
His attorneys have said in court filings their defense will include that Madigan “kept information close to the vest” and “kept private conversations with others private,” and that McClain “often talked mysteriously, cryptically, and oddly — including about and when referring to Madigan.”
According to the motion unsealed Tuesday, Mapes was asked more than 650 questions over hours of testimony that day, and that Mapes did his best to answer truthfully.
In his testimony, Mapes gave “high-level examples” of McClain passing along pieces of information providing his “perspective” to Madigan on “various matters,” attorney Andrew Porter stated in the motion.
But when questions turned to Mapes’ recollection of specific phone calls and dates, his memory was admittedly hazy, the motion stated.
At one point, immediately before one of the answers that prosecutors say was a lie, Mapes told the grand jury he had no recollection of an event, but could come back to it later if he was shown something and it “pops my memory,” the motion stated.
“The prosecutor did not follow up on any of these matters — nor did the prosecutor attempt to refresh Mr. Mapes’ recollection on any specific subject matters that could ‘pop’ Mr. Mapes’ memory,” Porter said.
The new filing reveals the FBI has recordings in which McClain and Mapes talked after Mr. Mapes’ retirement in 2018. But Porter wrote that none of those recordings prove Mapes was lying three years later when he told the grand jury he couldn’t recall specific “tasks” or “assignments” that he and McClain had talked about.
“Indeed, the government never played those conversations for Mr. Mapes in the grand jury,” the motion stated. “Nor did the government even reference those conversations in an attempt to refresh his memory or to probe his understanding of what Mr. McClain was talking about during those conversations.”
Madigan and McClain were indicted last month on racketeering conspiracy charges alleging a range of corruption schemes spanning more than a decade, including the scheme involving ComEd. Both have pleaded not guilty.
In addition to their motion to dismiss, Mapes’ attorneys also filed a second motion Friday asking that references to him being granted immunity by prosecutors be stricken from the indictment against him.
Mapes’ attorneys say there was no legal reason for prosecutors to include the references to immunization and speculated in their filing that prosecutors were putting other witnesses on notice about “the weapons at its disposal” if they didn’t testify as expected.
“One possible motive for adding such language to the indictment is to send a signal to other witnesses with whom the government was attempting to meet in 2021 concerning its investigation of Mr. Madigan,” the motion stated. “While the government may have had a motive to publicize to other potential witnesses the weapons at its disposal, the fact of immunization has no relevance to the charges against Mr. Mapes.”
Lee gave prosecutors two weeks to respond. A status hearing was set for June 1.
Mapes lost his public positions as Madigan’s chief of staff and House clerk in 2018, when a staffer accused Mapes of sexual harassment over several years and fostering “a culture of sexism, harassment and bullying that creates an extremely difficult working environment.”