From The Chicago Sun-Times:

McPier paid $179,000 for outside legal help

November 22, 2002

BY TIM NOVAK STAFF REPORTER

The agency that runs McCormick Place and Navy Pier has spent nearly $180,000 on a criminal defense attorney hired after a federal grand jury demanded various contracts and documents in the growing probe of corruption under Gov. Ryan.

The Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority has paid $179,506 during the last year to attorney Dan Reidy and his firm, Jones Day Reavis & Pogue, but the authority refused to disclose the actual bills. Reidy is charging as much as $540 an hour.

Rather than using staff attorneys, the McPier board hired Reidy a year ago to respond to the subpoenas and to advise the board when McPier CEO, Scott Fawell, was indicted last April on charges of illegally using state resources to elect Ryan as governor. Fawell, whom Ryan appointed as the McPier CEO, has been on paid leave from his $195,000 job.

While serving as McPier CEO, Fawell is accused of bid-rigging to steer more than $170,000 in contracts for printing and other services to former state Rep. Roger Stanley. Fawell had previously helped Stanley get work from the governor's campaign fund and the secretary of state's office under Ryan. Stanley, in return, allegedly gave Fawell prostitutes and free vacations in Costa Rica and Canada.

And last year, Fawell allegedly agreed to a kickback from Stanley to steer a multimillion-dollar engineering contract at McPier to a specific firm, but the deal was scotched because of scrutiny from federal investigators.