Ex-state Rep. Luis Arroyo was sentenced to almost five years in prison Wednesday for his role in a bribery scheme.
U.S. District Judge Steven Seeger handed down the 57-month sentence nearly seven months after Arroyo pleaded guilty, and four months after his lawyer said sending him to prison would be “no more effective than draining Lake Michigan with a spoon.”
Seeger responded by saying, “maybe judges need a bigger spoon.”
Arroyo entered a blind plea of guilty in November to a wire fraud count that said he was paid bribes in exchange for promoting legislation in Springfield. Defense attorney Michael Gillespie argued in a filing Wednesday that “Mr. Arroyo was not the recipient of a bribe but rather a conduit.”
But Gillespie took that back during Wednesday’s hearing, admitting Arroyo took multiple bribes.
Arroyo’s downfall came in October 2019, when Arroyo was arrested and charged in federal court with bribery. The case against him also signaled the end of another lengthy career in the state Capitol. The criminal complaint against Arroyo alleged that he gave a $2,500 bribe to a sitting state senator who had been cooperating with the feds with the hope of leniency when it came to his own tax troubles.
Though that senator was not named in the complaint, a source confirmed it was Terry Link. Link denied it, but he has since pleaded guilty to filing a false tax return, formally agreed to cooperate with prosecutors and resigned from the Senate. A memo filed by Gillespie ahead of Wednesday’s sentencing finally named Link outright.
Gillespie has taken the position that Arroyo simply passed a bribe to Link from the man who would become Arroyo’s co-defendant, businessman James T. Weiss.
Gillespie also adopted an argument floated on behalf of several other convicted Chicago politicians over the years — that sending Arroyo to prison would not deter other corrupt elected officials. Gillespie wrote that “Mr. Arroyo himself was undeterred by prior [news] reports when he met with Mr. Link in 2018.”
As for a prison sentence, Gillespie wrote, “it is no more effective than draining Lake Michigan with a spoon.”
Assistant U.S. Attorney James Durkin called that a “depressingly cynical perspective from a man who just a few years ago was a senior member of the Illinois House of Representatives.”
Weiss, son-in-law of former Cook County Democratic Party chairman and ex-county assessor Joseph Berrios, was added to the case in a superseding indictment one year after Arroyo’s arrest. The charges are still pending against Weiss, who has pleaded not guilty.
Arroyo pleaded guilty in November to the first count in that indictment, which charged him with wire fraud. It alleged that, in exchange for bribes from Weiss, Arroyo promoted legislation related to unlicensed “sweepstakes” gambling machines. The indictment said the men sought to enlist Link in the scheme, telling him bribe money could be disguised as a monthly consultant payment to a third party.
Arroyo gave Link a check for $2,500 in August 2019, telling him there would be a “check per month … six months to a year,” according to the indictment. He also told Link, “this is the jackpot,” prosecutors say.
Weiss had a package mailed to Link containing another $2,500 check in October 2019, according to the indictment.
Durkin wrote in a court memo that Weiss paid Arroyo $32,500 in bribes through checks from Weiss’ company, Collage, to Arroyo’s lobbying firm, Spartacus 3 LLC. Gillespie insists the judge should only consider $7,500 intended for Link, arguing that all other payments received by Arroyo’s firm were for “lawful lobbying activity.”
But Arroyo’s firm had been hired to lobby the Chicago City Council, not the General Assembly. It had been hired by a firm to which Weiss appeared to have no ties, Durkin wrote, adding that Arroyo never disclosed the relationship between his firm and Collage.
The arrangement suggested “an effort to conceal the relationship between Weiss and Arroyo,” according to Durkin.
