From the Tribune:

State cancels fraud-tainted lease
Contract holder tied to Rezko corruption
By Ray Gibson | Chicago Tribune reporter
September 26, 2008
Gov. Rod Blagojevich's administration has canceled a lucrative office lease with a convicted former state agency director who testified in the corruption trial of Antoin "Tony" Rezko.
The decision, announced Friday, came four months after the Tribune reported that Ali Ata had failed to disclose the names of his partners in that lease and three old leases, as required by law.
Ata was in line to receive up to $13 million under a contract extending to 2018 for a South Side office building used by the Illinois Department of Human Services.
Ata was a onetime associate of Rezko, the Blagojevich fundraiser convicted on federal charges that he used his political clout to orchestrate a multimillion-dollar kickback scheme.
Ata testified about his ownership of the building at Rezko's federal trial and alleged he secretly gave Rezko a piece of the state real estate deal. But attorneys for Rezko denied Ata's allegations, and Ata acknowledged under cross-examination that no records exist to prove his assertion.
Ata testified he also gave $25,000 to Blagojevich's campaign fund in return for winning his appointment in 2003 as the $127,000-a-year head of the Illinois Finance Authority.
All told, Ata donated about $65,000 to the governor's campaign fund and Blagojevich has been pressed in recent days about whether his campaign fund would return the donations. The governor said this week he was "going to work through the process and sort it out."
Ata's attorney could not be reached for comment.
The state entered into the lease in 1998 and in 2004 renewed it until 2018. Ata and his partners have been paid more than $3.4 million since 2004, state records show.
Alka Nayyar, a spokeswoman for the Illinois Department of Central Management Services, said the lease will end Feb. 1 under a provision in the contract that required the state to give 120 days' notice.
After Ata's testimony, state Sen. Jeffrey Schoenberg (D- Evanston) called for the state agency to cancel the lease and seek the return of the millions of dollars the state had paid the partners. Schoenberg had contended the partners had failed to comply with state law and disclose the building's true owners.
"I am obviously pleased with the agency's decision," Schoenberg said. "It is long overdue."
According to documents submitted by Rezko's defense team at trial, Ata actually lied to Central Management Services before his appointment to the cabinet post. Ata filed with the agency a statement saying he had assigned his interest in the property and was no longer involved in the property. His trial testimony contradicted that assertion.