Tale of 2 Fitzgeralds: A gloves-off story
John Kass
November 10, 2006
The old man's eyes filled with tears as Peter Fitzgerald was telling
a great political story.
The former senator explained to a downtown luncheon crowd on Thursday
how he outfoxed White House guru Karl Rove and the Illinois Combine
pressuring Rove to stop politically independent prosecutors from being
brought to this state.
"Karl Rove called back and said if you will not appoint anyone
[from] out of state, we'll let you pick anybody you want, as long
as that person is from Chicago," he said, as laughter broke out
at the lunch for the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform.
Political operatives know the history. Fitzgerald went to the press
first, to announce his choice of New Yorker Patrick Fitzgerald (no
relation) as U.S. attorney in Chicago.
This angered then-Gov. George Ryan and House Speaker Denny Hastert,
City Hall and the crowd that figured they owned the federal hammer
in Chicago.
But the old man with the wet eyes wasn't laughing. He wasn't at lunch
with Fitzgerald. Yet his tears certainly were a product of the former
senator's gumption.
Donald Tomczak, 72, the corrupt ex-water department boss for Mayor
Richard Daley, stood in federal court a few blocks away, his face
and shoulders sagging, looking at 47 months in federal prison. And
more time to be added if Tomczak doesn't testify in future City Hall
corruption cases yet to be announced.
Tomczak lawyer Patrick Cotter said his client was merely a product
of the old Chicago Democratic machine.
Tomczak's Republican son, former Will County State's Atty. Jeff Tomczak,
was there. Republican Jeff was also a product of that Democratic machine
because his dad brought hordes of Democratic precinct captains to
Will County to elect his son Republican prosecutor a few years ago.
"Now you have got your pound of flesh from him," Jeff Tomczak
scolded reporters, asking that they leave his dad alone.
I'm not interested in Don Tomczak's flesh. But the feds are interested
in what's in Tomczak's head.
Before Daley became mayor, he vowed to throw Tomczak out the window
of City Hall because Tomczak muscled Daley's precinct captains. But
once he became king of Chicago, the mayor protected Tomczak, who was
the creation of mayoral political brain Tim Degnan.
Tomczak ran trucks on water projects, took at least $400,000 in bribes
and commanded armies of political patronage workers hired in violation
of federal court decree.
"Clearly, some of Mr. Tomczak's crimes were condoned, they were
facilitated and I believe in some respects they were honored by high-ranking
portions of the City of Chicago," Assistant U.S. Atty. Patrick
Collins said.
I wonder what he means by that. It's just the kind of federal wisecrack
that can bring on some bad mayoral indigestion, especially after Daley
feasted the night before on $1,000 plates of corned beef at his Manny's
Restaurant fundraiser.
He feasted yet again on the news that potential mayoral challengers
U.S. Reps. Jesse Jackson Jr. and Luis Gutierrez would not challenge
his reign.
Don Tomczak shook hands with prosecutors and agents in court, and,
judging by the mayor's reaction, City Hall must have heard about this
ominous pressing of flesh.
"He disgraced his family," Daley said of Tomczak. "Basically,
he destroyed himself."
When Daley's guys do federal time with their mouths shut, the mayor
praises them, or sends their sons $40 million in city contracts.
Still, the mayor said he never had any intention of firing Tomczak
years ago, despite those boasts about that fifth-floor window.
"I didn't care what allegiance they had as long as they were
doing the job," Daley said. "... My father [the late Mayor
Richard J. Daley] taught me that, and my church beliefs taught me
that--never be vindictive against people."
The swarm of political ghosts that haunt City Hall, those with "Mayoral
Fall Guy" tattooed on their foreheads, would quibble, but they're
dead, politically.
For his part, former senator Fitzgerald also reached back to old Chicago
in telling his story.
He said he decided on an outsider for U.S. attorney here, someone
untouchable by the Combine, after reading a biography of the late
Tribune Publisher Col. Robert R. McCormick, who asked the White House
to send untouchables to Chicago to hunt gangster Al Capone.
Rove, Fitzgerald said, was merely responding to pressure from Illinois
Republicans, and the former senator thanked President Bush for nominating
Patrick Fitzgerald.
Once the New York fed was introduced to journalists here on Mother's
Day of 2001, it would have been difficult for the Combine to stop
the appointment, Peter Fitzgerald said.
"I intended to appoint someone who was not a political hack but
independent of both political parties," he said. "And I
said they're going to be screaming like a stuck pig when I do this."
They squealed back then. And others have more squealing to do.
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jskass@tribune.com
Copyright © 2006, Chicago Tribune
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