Metro East Sun

Sen. Rachelle Crowe (D-Glen Carbon) collected $1,000 in campaign contributions from a group tied to disgraced Chicago Alderman Ed Burke in 2017, according to an expenditure list provided by the Illinois State Board of Elections.

The contribution was from the Burnham Committee, of which Burke is the chairman.

Crowe did not respond to the Metro East Sun's questions about if Burke should resign his position as alderman, why the group would want to contribute to her campaign fund, or if Crowe will return the donation.

Burke was first charged in a criminal complaint in January 2019. He was indicted four months later on 14 charges, including racketeering, federal program bribery, attempted coercion, conspiracy to commit extortion and using interstate commerce to encourage illegal activity. He has yet to resign as an alderman.

“Again and again, Burke shamelessly tied official action to his law firm’s receipt of business,” prosecutors wrote, as reported by the Chicago Tribune. “The government acted more than reasonably in investigating Burke’s conduct, an inquiry that revealed Burke to be thoroughly corrupt and worthy of prosecution.”

Burke also allegedly made anti-Semitic comments on a wiretapped call regarding the development of the old main post office, one of the key episodes in the case, according to prosecutors.

“Well, you know as well as I do, Jews are Jews and they’ll deal with Jews to the exclusion of everybody else unless there’s a reason for them to use a Christian,” Burke allegedly said, referring to the owner of the development company heading up the post office project.

Burke's attorneys have requested that the potentially inciting words be removed from the lawsuit. Prosecutors, however, argued in their motion filed April 28 that it was applicable to the alleged scheme as Burke was attempting to get the company owner to hire his law firm.

“By his own words, in wiretapped conversations, Alderman Burke said and did things that not only were improper but seemed to be illegal,” Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot stated in a separate news conference.

Burke's lawyers have argued that the information obtained from wiretaps on Burke's cellphone and City Hall should be suppressed, accusing prosecutors of ordering former Alderman Daniel Solis to have "scripted interactions" with Burke and lie about the post office contract.

According to Burke's lawyers, Solis entered into a deferred prosecution agreement with the government Jan. 3, 2019, the same day Burke was charged. This was only a few days after Solis suddenly announced his retirement and just days before court records were erroneously unsealed, revealing Solis had been secretly recorded by a developer.

In response, Burke's lawyers are requesting that the wiretapped calls be declared inadmissible at trial, arguing that prosecutors "recklessly and intentionally" failed to disclose in the Title III wiretap application that they used a "desperate" alderman to capture Burke committing a crime. They maintain Burke never agreed to provide any official action in return for private business on tape.

Prosecutors, however, refuted this claim, noting that undercover recordings and other facts identified at least 23 instances in which Burke discussed an alleged plan to extort legitimate business related to the post office project with Solis.