Maloney Jurors Say Verdict Is Message

Jurors who found former Criminal Court Judge Thomas J. Maloneyguilty of fixing three murder trials said they wanted to send themessage they're fed up with "crooks" in office.

Maloney, 67, who retired in 1990, earned a new page in thehistory books of judicial corruption with his conviction Friday oncharges he rigged four felony cases, including three murder trials,during 13 years as a judge.

Assistant U.S. Attorney William Hogan Jr. said Maloney is thefirst judge here - and probably in the nation - to be convicted offixing a murder case. One double-murder fix in particular showed"unbridled arrogance," Hogan said, because it occurred three yearsafter the Operation Greylord probe of court corruption became public.

Maloney is the 17th judge to be convicted here and the secondfound guilty of post-Greylord corruption.

"We all agreed this is the message we wanted to send: `We wanthonest people in office,' " said juror Marion Morel, 66. "Theseoffices are too high to have crooks in them."

Convicted with Maloney was attorney Robert McGee, 52, accused ofacting as his "bagman" in three cases.

McGee now faces 15 years in prison and Maloney 15 to 25 years attheir Aug. 8 sentencing before U.S. District Judge Harry D.Leinenweber.

Both men were found guilty of racketeering, racketeeringconspiracy and extortion, and Maloney was convicted of an additionalcount of obstructing justice for asking attorney William Swano, thegovernment's key witness, if he was "standing tall" and refusing tocooperate with prosecutors.

Within the racketeering verdict, jurors found McGee had acted asbagman in three cases and Maloney fixed four cases. Morel said thepanel was deadlocked 10-2 in Maloney's favor on a fifth alleged fixwithin the racketeering count because there was not enoughcorroboration.

Three of the federal government's most significantinvestigations in decades converged to result in Maloney's andMcGee's 1991 indictment, said Hogan and co-prosecutors ScottMendeloff and Diane MacArthur.

The probes by the FBI and the Internal Revenue Service datedback to 1983 during the waning days of Greylord, continued in 1986with a probe of the El Rukn street gang, and ended in 1987 during theOperation Gambat probe of 1st Ward corruption.

Defense attorneys blasted Swano and two witnesses from thefederal probes as "conmen extraordinaire" out to "save their hides,"and vowed to appeal.

But Mendeloff said Swano's testimony was particularly"horrific," because he said Maloney convicted an "innocent" clientafter Swano neglected - for the first time in six years - to offerthe judge a bribe.

The cornerstone of the government's case was Swano's testimonythat three years after Greylord became public, he gave McGee $10,000to pass to Maloney to acquit two Rukn "generals" charged with adouble murder. Swano said Maloney later returned the money andconvicted the men - allegedly for fear the FBI was onto the fix.

Defense attorneys argued Swano was a cash-strapped cocaine userwho planned to pocket the bribe and win the case by rigging thewitnesses, but was foiled when Maloney convicted the two Rukns. Ajury sentenced both to death.

Among the keys to the verdict, jurors said, was Maloney'spattern of buying $50,000 in money orders over six years -particularly right after an alleged fix. Prosecutors argued Maloneyhid bribes in the money orders.

Juror Rodney Kauer, 27, described McGee's seven-year-old homephone records as "the clincher." A Wedgewood Communications phonecompany worker, subpoenaed for other records by prosecutors near theclose of their case, walked in with the bombshell evidence afterSwano's testimony.

The records meshed neatly with Swano's testimony that McGeecalled him in Maloney's courtroom on June 19, 1986, to say Maloneywanted to back out of the fix. They showed McGee called Maloney'schambers three times on that date, and then called Maloney'scourtroom. Minutes later, Rukn wiretaps showed, an El Rukn reportedby phone to jailed leader Jeff Fort that Maloney was having "secondthoughts" about the fix.

U.S. Attorney Michael Shepard said the verdict proved in"Maloney's courtroom, for the right price, you could get away withmurder. . . . We thought we had seen it all . . . in Cook County.But Maloney took us to new depths."