Indictment with 8 new counts is handed up in Blagojevich case

CHICAGO — Former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was re-indicted in his corruption case Thursday as prosecutors seek to keep an upcoming decision from the U.S. Supreme Court on “honest services” fraud from delaying Blagojevich’s June trial.

The new 24-count indictment was handed up by a federal grand jury, the U.S. attorney’s office in Chicago announced.

Blagojevich was indicted last April on 16 counts, including racketeering conspiracy.

The revised indictment does not allege any new
wrongdoing by Blagojevich but includes eight new counts that do not
rely on honest services fraud.

The new charges include racketeering, attempted
extortion, bribery, conspiracy to commit bribery and conspiracy to
commit extortion.

The underlying wrongdoing still includes Blagojevich’s alleged attempt to sell the U.S. Senate seat vacated by President Barack Obama and other alleged efforts to leverage the powers of his office.

One of Blagojevich’s lawyers, Aaron Goldstein, said the revised indictment does not alter the defense’s stance for the trial scheduled to begin in June.

“The new indictment is longer in terms of volume,
but it contains no new factual allegations,” Goldstein said. “As we
have maintained from day one, the governor has done nothing wrong.”

—

(c) 2010, Chicago Tribune.

Visit the Chicago Tribune on the Internet at http://www.chicagotribune.com/

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.