Former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert, an Illinois Republican, was indicted Thursday on charges that he lied to the FBI about the purpose of $1.7 million in bank withdrawals and structured those withdrawals in $10,000 increments so as to avoid federal requirements regarding the reporting of large transactions. The indictment says Hastert in fact withdrew the money to provide payment to a single individual to compensate the individual for Hastert’s “past bad acts.”
From BuzzFeed political reporter John Stanton:
Although the indictment specifies neither the “bad acts” nor the victims, sources said they could be from before Hastert, who is now a lobbyist in Washington, entered politics in 1980.
The indictment alleges that Hastert regularly met someone referred to as “Individual A” and provided cash to that person “in order to compensate for and conceal his prior misconduct against Individual A.” Individual A is identified as someone who has been “a resident of Yorkville, Illinois and has known defendant JOHN DENNIS HASTERT most of Individual A’s life.” Before entering politics, Hastert was a teacher and wrestling coach at Yorkville High School.
Correction, May 29, 2015: This post originally misstated that Dennis Hastert had made a $3.5 million payment to “Individual A.” In fact, Hastert is alleged to have agreed to pay Individual A $3.5 million and to have withdrawn $1.7 million from various bank accounts between 2010 and 2014 in order to fulfill that agreement.
