From the SJ-R: 
 
Fawell: Experts reviewed contracts 
Testifies he doesn’t know if Ryan set them up for Warner 
 
By MIKE RAMSEY 
 COPLEY NEWS SERVICE 
 
Published Tuesday, October 18, 2005 
 
 CHICAGO - Lucrative secretary of state contracts for a mainframe computer system and digital driver’s licenses were evaluated by top staff before George Ryan approved them, the politician’s top aide in the 1990s testified Monday. 
 
 Prosecution witness Scott Fawell said the task of picking vendors for the jobs was delegated to department experts. He said he wasn’t aware of Ryan, then secretary of state, steering the contracts to lobbyist Larry Warner, which is a major accusation in Ryan’s conspiracy trial in U.S. District Court in Chicago. 
 
 Fawell’s remarks came as Ryan defense lawyer Dan Webb cross-examined the imprisoned racketeer for a third days. 
 
Fawell, 48, has agreed to help prosecutors in a deal to help his fiancee, who is indicted in unrelated cases. He was a chief of staff for Ryan and managed the Kankakee Republican’s successful 1998 campaign for governor. 
 
 In a nearly $30 million contract to replace failing secretary of state computers, prosecutors say Warner, a longtime Ryan friend and adviser, tried to shake down technology vendor Honeywell Bull before he was hired by IBM, which eventually clinched the deal. 
 
 Ryan’s information-services director, Frank Cavallaro, recommended IBM after he reviewed bids from the two competitors, according to a May 1996 memo that Webb reviewed with Fawell. IBM also got the nod from Andersen Consulting and a separate advisory committee, the memo from Cavallaro to Ryan said. 
 
Cavallaro wrote that Honeywell Bull would need a year to deliver the system parts, while IBM could provide the components immediately. Fawell said Ryan later signed the IBM contract by proxy, or “autopen,” and the computers apparently worked fine. 
 
 “I never heard a complaint, so I figured no news was good news,” Fawell said. 
 
He said an advisory committee of secretary of state employees also studied proposals for the digital conversion of Illinois driver’s licenses. For that project, Fawell said, driver services director Mike Chamness and Cavallaro recommended a firm called Viisage Technologies, which Warner also represented. 
 
 Fawell said he liked that the company used “facial recognition” technology to prevent fraud, and he and Ryan OK’d the 1997 deal. 
 
 “When you signed off on this, did you feel good about this?” Webb asked Fawell. 
 
 “Yeah, I’d say I did,” Fawell said. 
 
Fawell said Ryan was not directly involved in another Warner-related transaction, the relocation of secretary of state divisions from one Loop building to another. Fawell said he knew Warner was “sponsor” of a site at 17 N. State St., which was selected after procurement staff examined the property. Ryan’s “autopen” signature finalized the 1991 lease, which was reviewed by general counsel Roger Bickel and other officials, according to a copy shown to jurors. 
 
 “Normally George Ryan would not even see the lease - is that correct?” Webb asked. 
 
“That’s correct - nor would I,” Fawell said. 
 
 Monday’s detail-oriented testimony about the contracts and lease proved wearisome for some jurors. At least two were observed briefly nodding off in court, prompting U.S District Judge Rebecca Pallmeyer to dismiss the panel about half an hour early for the day. The trial of Ryan and co-defendant Warner began late last month and is expected to last several more weeks. 
 
 Meanwhile, prosecutors backed off their request that Pallmeyer strike Fawell’s earlier testimony about the 12 weeks he spent last year being shuffled from his Yankton, S.D., prison camp to a brief Chicago court hearing and back. Ryan’s attorneys say the unusually long journey, which included a layover at a maximum-security prison in Terre Haute, Ind., influenced the once-defiant Fawell to cooperate with the feds and turn on his former boss. 
 
 Pallmeyer already has told jurors that the U.S. Marshals Service handled Fawell’s transportation, but prosecutors want an even stronger instruction that they are not to blame. Defense lawyers and prosecutors said they would try to hammer out the language together. 
 
 Ryan, 71, and Warner, 67, are charged in a 22-count indictment that alleges that Ryan helped Warner and other insiders get state business in exchange for cash, trips and other gifts. The corruption charges stem from Ryan’s 1991-99 tenure as secretary of state and his subsequent four-year term as governor.