Michael Madigan, ComEd and corruption — how the probe unfolded

One week after former Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan was indicted on federal racketeering charges, he pleaded not guilty through an attorney.

[ Ex-Speaker Michael Madigan pleads not guilty to federal racketeering charges in corruption case ]

Madigan resigned from the Illinois house and also resigned as chairman of the state Democratic Party in February 2021, after spending 36 years as House speaker and a half-century in the Illinois House. The embattled 79-year-old lawmaker released a lengthy statement on Feb. 18, 2021.

[ Read it: The 106-page indictment of Michael Madigan on federal racketeering charges ]

What’s publicly known about federal efforts related to the now former speaker’s political operation stretches back to at least May 2019. Subpoenas or raids have touched lobbyists, legislators, private companies and members of Madigan’s political operation.

[ Ex-House Speaker Michael Madigan indicted on federal racketeering charges alleging array of bribery schemes ]

Born: April 19, 1942, in Chicago

Early life: Attended St. Adrian’s Elementary School

1960: St. Ignatius College Prep

1964: Notre Dame, B.A., Economics

1967: Loyola University Law School

After law school: Held patronage jobs as a hearing officer for the Illinois Commerce Commission and as a public utilities consultant for the city, according to a 1988 Tribune story.

1969: Elected as a delegate to the Illinois constitutional convention. Also elected a Democratic committeeman.

1970: Elected to the Illinois House for his district on the city’s Southwest Side.

1977: Entered House Democratic leadership.

1983: Elected speaker of the House, holding the post continuously through January except for two years in the mid-1990s when Republicans gained control of the chamber. He was ousted from the position in January 2021.

1998: Elected chairman of the Illinois Democratic Party. He stepped down in February 2021.

Family: Married to Shirley Madigan, has three daughters, one son and four grandchildren. His daughter Lisa Madigan was Illinois attorney general from 2003 to 2019.

Work: An attorney, Madigan is a partner at Madigan & Getzendanner, a firm that works in Chicago’s lucrative field of commercial property tax appeals.

Sources: Illinois General Assembly, Northern Illinois University Libraries, Notre Dame, Loyola University, Chicago Tribune archives

Here is how the saga unfolded.

MID-MAY 2019

FBI raids the Southwest Side residence of former Ald. Michael Zalewski, who at the time was working with House Speaker Michael Madigan to get lobbying work from ComEd.

MID-MAY 2019

Feds raid the City Club of Chicago offices in the Wrigley building seeking records pertaining to club President Jay Doherty, a longtime ComEd lobbyist.

MID-MAY 2019

The feds raid the Far South Side home of former 13th Ward political operative Kevin Quinn — the brother of Ald. Marty Quinn — who was ousted by Madigan amid a sexual harassment scandal in 2018. Quinn received checks from current and former ComEd lobbyists.

MID-MAY 2019

The FBI raids the downstate home of Mike McClain, a longtime ComEd lobbyist who is widely known as one of Speaker Madigan’s closest confidants. The Tribune exclusively reported in November that the FBI had tapped McClain’s cellphone.

JULY 12, 2019

ComEd reveals in a regulatory filing that it was subpoenaed by a federal grand jury investigating the utility’s lobbying practices.

SEPT. 24, 2019

Federal agents raid the Springfield and Cicero offices and the Southwest Side home of the longtime Democratic state senator as part of an ongoing criminal investigation.

OCT. 4, 2019

ComEd reveals in another regulatory filing it received a second federal grand jury subpoena related to its lobbying practices, this time specifically requesting any communications with state Sen. Sandoval and other unnamed individuals and entities.

OCT. 15, 2019

Anne Pramaggiore, CEO of ComEd parent company Exelon Utilities, abruptly stepped down after it was revealed the utility’s lobbying practices were under criminal investigation.

OCT. 29, 2019

“I’m not a target of anything,” Madigan told reporters at the Illinois Capitol. In a statement, he called for a review and strengthening of ethics and lobbying laws.

NOVEMBER 2019

Federal authorities recorded Madigan confidant McClain’s phone calls as part of the investigation into ComEd’s lobbying practices, sources told the Chicago Tribune. One of the sources said the recordings were made as a result of an FBI wiretap on McClain’s cellphone.

DECEMBER 2019

Federal authorities have asked questions about Madigan and his political operation as part of an ongoing investigation about connections between Commonwealth Edison lobbyists and Madigan, lobbyists giving contracts to people tied to the speaker, and city, state and suburban government jobs held by his associates, four people who have been interviewed told the Tribune.

FEBRUARY 2020

A pair of federal grand jury subpoenas seeking records from southwest suburban Merrionette Park and Bridgeview named Madigan, his former chief of staff Timothy Mapes, McClain, Marty Quinn and Kevin Quinn. The documents also called for copies of state and federal tax records related to Raymond Nice, a longtime precinct captain in Madigan’s vaunted 13th Ward operation.

APRIL 2020

Madigan’s main campaign fund paid nearly $462,000 in legal fees in the first three months of 2020 to a law firm that employs former Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley, campaign finance records show. In the final quarter of 2019, Madigan’s campaign fund paid more than $445,000 for legal fees to different firms, which a Madigan spokeswoman at the time said was to cover the cost of a $275,000 settlement with a former campaign worker, as well as ongoing civil cases and routine staff training.

JULY 17, 2020

ComEd is paying a $200 million criminal fine as part of a federal investigation into a “yearslong bribery scheme” involving jobs, contracts and payments to allies of Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, the U.S. attorney’s office in Chicago announced Friday. Additionally, prosecutors asked Madigan’s office for “any and all documents and communications” concerning AT&T, including contracts and correspondence related to the hiring of anyone to provide consulting or lobbying services to the public utility, according to a subpoena the Tribune obtained through an open records request.

JULY 23, 2020

The Tribune reported that AT&T was subpoenaed earlier this year by federal prosecutors in the operation encircling Madigan’s political operation.

JULY 2020

A federal subpoena to Madigan’s office showed investigators were interested in a wide range of information, including dealings with Walgreens and Rush University Medical Center, records related to Madigan’s political organization and private property tax appeals law firm, as well as former state lawmakers and current or former Chicago aldermen.

NOV. 18, 2020

McClain is charged with bribery conspiracy and bribery in an indictment returned by a federal grand jury. Also charged are former ComEd CEO Pramaggiore; lobbyist and former ComEd executive John Hooker, of Chicago; and Doherty, a consultant and former head of the City Club of Chicago.

NOV. 19, 2020

The embattled Illinois House Speaker releases a statement saying that if anyone at ComEd had tried to bribe him, “it was never made known to me.”

DEC. 2, 2020

McClain, Pramaggiore, Hooker and Doherty pleaded not guilty to charges they orchestrated an elaborate bribery scheme with Commonwealth Edison to funnel money and do-nothing jobs to Madigan loyalists in exchange for the speaker’s help with state legislation.

JAN. 13, 2021

Emanuel “Chris” Welch is elected the state’s first Black speaker of the House after Democrats rejected Madigan’s bid to maintain the single-handed power he wielded over the state for nearly four decades.

FEB. 18, 2021

Madigan announces his resignation from the Illinois House after representing a Southwest Side district for a half-century, the majority of that time as the powerful speaker, but remains chairman of the state Democratic Party.

FEB. 21, 2021

Edward Guerra Kodatt, 26, a bilingual outreach and budget assistant in the constituent services office run by Madigan and 13th Ward Ald. Marty Quinn, is installed in the Illinois House seat that was vacated by Madigan.

FEB. 22, 2021

Cook County Clerk Karen Yarbrough, previously party vice chair, takes over on an interim basis.

FEB. 24, 2021

Despite the ill-fated Kodatt pick, Madigan gets another shot at appointing a replacement. The former speaker remains the 13th Ward Democratic committeeman and holds 56% of the weighted vote cast in the 22nd House District.

FEB. 25, 2021

Angelica Guerrero-Cuellar becomes the second replacement in four days for the Illinois House seat formerly held by Madigan.

MARCH 5, 2021

The charges allege Acevedo attempted to evade paying taxes he owed, including by depositing cash payments into his bank account to conceal the source of income. He was also charged with four misdemeanor counts of failing to file a tax return from 2015 to 2018. Acevedo faces up to five years in prison on the most serious counts.

MAY 26, 2021

Tim Mapes, former longtime chief of staff to House Speaker Michael Madigan, is indicted on charges of lying to a federal grand jury investigating allegations that Commonwealth Edison paid bribes in exchange for Madigan’s assistance pushing though legislation in Springfield.

He pleads not guilty two days later.

MAY 27, 2021

An outgrowth of a case that arose from the ComEd bribes-for-favors scandal, Collins is charged with falsely claiming $31,830 in travel expenses on her tax returns.

Collins, who previously lobbied for ComEd, was hit with the new charge of filing a false tax return for the calendar year 2018 in a superseding indictment filed May 26, 2021 that added the allegations to a broader tax case.

JUNE 2021

The Tribune learns among their discussions was a plan to turn a state-owned parcel of land in Chinatown into a commercial development. Though the land deal never was consummated, it’s been a source of continued interest for federal investigators, who last year subpoenaed Madigan’s office for records and communications he’d had with key players. At least one of them recently appeared before the grand jury investigating Madigan’s political operation, sources told the Tribune.

SEPTEMBER 2021

Text messages, obtained by the Tribune through an open records request, show Dougherty repeatedly tried to downplay his role in the ComEd probe to the mayor in 2020 even after federal agents raided the City Club’s offices in the Wrigley Building in the spring of 2019.

DEC. 14, 2021

Acevedo, 58, entered his plea to one count of tax evasion during a hearing via videoconference before U.S. District Judge Matthew Kennelly.

The plea scuttles a jury trial that had been set for Jan. 10, 2022.

JANUARY 2022

The most remarkable thing about the Commonwealth Edison bribery probe in 2021 might be what didn’t happen.

MARCH 2, 2022

The indictment was returned by a federal grand jury after a more than two-year investigation, according to federal prosecutors. Among the alleged schemes outlined in the indictment was a plan by utility giant Commonwealth Edison to pay thousands of dollars to lobbyists favored by Madigan in order to win his influence over legislation the company wanted passed in Springfield.

MARCH 9, 2022

A week after he was charged in a bombshell corruption indictment, Madigan, 79, was arraigned in a telephone hearing in U.S. District Court on allegations he ran his elected office and political operation as a criminal enterprise that provided personal financial rewards for him and his associates.

MARCH 23, 2021

Acevedo’s attorneys had asked for a term of probation, but U.S. District Judge Matthew Kennelly said his background as a former elected official and a Chicago police officer meant that people were paying attention, and a sentence of probation would seem like “this person got a pass.”

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OCT. 13, 2022

Timothy Mapes, the former chief of staff to then-Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, walked into the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse for a status hearing on charges he lied to a federal grand jury investigating the alleged ComEd scheme. He was the first of six people who have been charged as part of the ComEd bribery scandal to set foot in a federal courtroom.

OCT. 14, 2022

AT&T agreed to pay a $23 million fine as part of a federal criminal investigation into the company’s illegal efforts to influence former House Speaker Michael Madigan.

Federal prosecutors also unsealed a superseding indictment against Madigan and his longtime confidant, Michael McClain, adding allegations about the AT&T Illinois scheme.

Check out the Tribune’s archives at your fingertips at Newspapers.com.

Sources: Court documents, news reports and Chicago Tribune reporting