Closing arguments were set to begin Wednesday in the bribery trial of a politically connected Chicago businessman accused of arranging to pay off two state legislators in exchange for their assistance pushing legislation beneficial to his sweepstakes gaming machine operation.
James T. Weiss, 44, who is the son-in-law of former Cook County Democratic boss Joseph Berrios, is charged in a superseding indictment filed in October 2020 with bribery, wire fraud, mail fraud and lying to the FBI. He has pleaded not guilty.
Prosecutors rested their case Wednesday morning after three full days of testimony featuring some 14 witnesses, including former state Sen. Terry Link, who secretly recorded phone calls and meetings with Weiss as well as then-state Rep. Luis Arroyo, who later pleaded guilty to arranging the bribery scheme.
Weiss’ attorneys did not put on any evidence. In April they’d filed a list of 26 potential witnesses, including lobbyist Shaw Decremer, a former top aide to House Speaker Michael Madigan; Vanessa Berrios, the daughter of former Cook County Democratic boss Joseph Berrios; ex-state Rep. Annazette Collins; Madigan-connected consultant Djavan Conway, and Jeffrey Rush, the son of former U.S. Rep. Bobby Rush.
After prosecutors wrapped up their evidence, U.S. District Judge Steven Seeger advised Weiss of his right to testify and asked him if he wished to take the stand in his own defense. “No, your honor,” Weiss said.
Closing arguments will begin after a lunch break, and then the jury of eight women and four men will begin deliberating the case.
The trial centers on the largely uncharted world of sweepstakes machines, sometimes called “gray machines,” which allow customers to put in money, receive a coupon to redeem for merchandise online and then play electronic games like slot machines.
Since the machines can be played for free, they are not considered gambling devices. Critics, however, contend the unregulated devices, which operate in cities, including Chicago, that have banned video gambling, are designed to skirt the law.
Prosecutors have alleged Weiss desperately wanted the state’s gambling expansion bill to include language explicitly legalizing sweepstakes machines, but it was left out of the proposal in the 2019 spring session. Weiss then agreed to pay monthly $2,500 bribes to get a deal done, first to Arroyo and later to Link, who was a chief sponsor of the gambling bill in the Senate, according to prosecutors.
Unbeknownst to both Arroyo and Weiss was that Link, a Vernon Hills Democrat, was cooperating with the FBI. Link, who is hoping for a break on his own federal tax conviction in exchange for his cooperation, testified over two days beginning last week about his undercover role.
Arroyo, meanwhile, pleaded guilty to bribery but did not agree to cooperate with prosecutors. U.S. District Judge Steven Seeger sentenced Arroyo to nearly five years in prison last year, calling him a “corruption superspreader.”
The weeklong trial has been filled with political intrigue, both in the lineup of current and former elected officials who have testified as well as the backdrop of ongoing federal investigations swirling around Weiss’ associates, including the Cook County assessor’s office that Berrios once helmed.
But references to Berrios have been largely kept out of the trial. On Tuesday, the jury for the first time heard a veiled reference to the Democratic stalwart when prosecutors played a portion of a recorded interview Weiss gave to the FBI after being pulled over near his west suburban home in October 2019.
In trying to explain how he came to send a $2,500 check to a “consultant” who was actually invented by investigators, Weiss, who is married to Berrios’ daughter, former state Rep. Toni Berrios, told the agents a story about how hard it had been to gain traction with legislators in Springfield on the subject of sweepstakes machines.
Weiss said that it was so bad that even then-state Sen. Terry Link, who was spearheading the state’s gambling overhaul and knew his father-in-law well, told him off in vulgar terms at the Capitol.
“My father-in-law interacted with Terry Link for 30 years, and (Link) told me, ‘(Expletive) you’ to my face,” Weiss said on the recording. “I didn’t know what to do.”
Berrios, who was head of the Cook County Democratic Party and also served as Cook County assessor from 2011 to 2019, has not been accused of wrongdoing, and Weiss’ defense team had argued to keep his name out of the trial to avoid prejudicing the jury.
The only other time the Berrios family’s name has been mentioned came later on Tuesday, when jurors were shown a Post-it note Weiss wrote instructing that paperwork purportedly involving the consulting contract be signed and emailed to a Vanessa Berrios, who was working as Weiss’ assistant at his valet parking company.
Among the current and former elected officials to testify for prosecutors was state Rep. Bob Rita, D-Blue Island, and ex-state Sen. Tony Munoz. They both told the jury about Arroyo’s push to add language legalizing sweepstakes gaming machines to the gambling legislation in 2019, telling the jury he hounded them for meetings to the point of aggravation.
The testimony also focused on a parallel fight that went on at Chicago’s City Hall., where Arroyo was operating as a paid lobbyist for Weiss’ company regarding sweepstakes machine issues.
On Tuesday afternoon, prosecutors called former Ald. Patrick O’Connor, the longtime City Council floor leader, who testified that he proposed a ban on sweepstakes machines in 2018 after seeing them in operation at a gambling house next door to a high school.
O’Connor, who was defeated in 2019 after 36 years in City Council, said he met with Weiss one time about sweepstakes machines in the fall of 2018 at his 40th Ward office.
“He just kind of stated that he felt my position was incorrect and we just agreed that we weren’t agreeing, and that was pretty much it,” O’Connor said.
O’Connor also revealed that in June 2019, just a month after leaving office, he was hired as a $5,000-a-month consultant by video gaming king Rick Heidner. O’Connor said that about four months into his yearlong contract, Heidner asked him if he would cancel it.
“He made it clear that his plans had changed and he wasn’t going to need my assistance,” O’Connor testified.
The termination of the deal coincided with Heidner’s name surfacing in federal search warrants and subpoenas as part of a widening federal corruption probe involving then-state Sen. Martin Sandoval.
That October, the Tribune also exclusively reported that Heidner, who at the time was asking the state for permission to build a southwest suburban horse track and casino, had long-standing business ties to a banking family whose financial involvement with mob figures helped sink a Rosemont casino.
Heidner was never accused of wrongdoing, and the U.S. attorney’s office later gave him a non-target letter indicating he was not a part of the federal probe into Sandoval and his associates.
Thought the jury did not hear any of the specifics of those investigations, Weiss’ attorney, Ilia Usharovich, asked O’Connor repeatedly on cross-examination why he quit consulting for Heidner even though he was being paid handsomely to do little work.
“That’s the nature of a consulting contract,” he said. “I fulfilled my end by being available. He fulfilled his end by paying me.”
“Was Mr. Heidner ever under investigation?” Usharovich asked.
“I believe there was an investigation of the entire gaming industry in Springfield at some point in time,” O’Connor said.
Also testifying for prosecutors Tuesday was Sam Toia, president of the Illinois Restaurant Association, who said he helped Weiss promote sweepstakes gaming machines with the city to move them out of “the gray area” and get them on the books where they could help struggling restaurant owners bring in additional revenue.
“We were out there promoting electronic devices, and sweepstakes machines were electronic devices,” Toia said. “I understand independent restaurants and I wanted to help them so they could pay their income taxes.”
In his testimony, Link took the jury through the meetings and phone calls he secretly recorded for the FBI, including one at a Wendy’s restaurant in Highland Park as well as another meeting weeks later at a Skokie pancake house, where Arroyo allegedly handed over the first $2,500 check from Weiss.
“This is, this is the jackpot,” Arroyo told Link as he handed over the check, according to the recording played for the jury Monday. Additional monthly $2,500 payments were expected to be made over the next six to 12 months, totaling $30,000, the charges alleged.
At the direction of the FBI, Link had told Arroyo to have the checks made out to a purported associate named Katherine Hunter, who didn’t actually exist.
When Weiss was later questioned by agents, he lied and said Hunter was a lobbyist who lived in Winnetka and that he’d spoken to her on the phone, according to a recording of the interview also played for the jury Monday.
Weiss’ attorneys have argued Weiss was paying Arroyo as a legitimate consultant for his business, and that trying to enlist another politician’s help is not a crime.
Testimony Tuesday began with prosecutors playing a portion of Weiss’ recorded interview with two FBI agents after they pulled him over to serve him with a warrant to seize his cellphone in October 2019. During the clip, FBI Special Agent Curtis Heide confronted Weiss about his claim that he’d talked with Katherine Hunter — who did not exist.
“You never had a phone conversation with Katherine Hunter. You didn’t,” Heide said on the tape.
“There was a woman who Luis (Arroyo) put me in on the phone with,” Weiss insisted. “We were … where the hell was it? We met in person. … I’m trying to give you guys the details.”
Suddenly Weiss remembered they were at Tavern on Rush. He said he and Arroyo were at the restaurant on Chicago’s Near North Side when Arroyo said, “I gotta put you on the phone with Katherine about engaging in the agreement.”
“OK, and he said Katherine?” one of the agents asked.
“I believe it was Katherine, yes,” Weiss replied.
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On cross-examination, Usharovich pressed Heide about his interrogation methods, suggesting Weiss was intimidated and not given ample opportunity to get out of the car or ask for a lawyer.
Heide said Weiss was free to leave at any time, although they still would have seized his phone. The agent also testified that Weiss had boasted, “He was not a rookie and that he could get an attorney but that he would continue to speak with us.”
Usharovich also played a clip from the interview where Weiss was being grilled about driving Arroyo to the meeting at the Skokie pancake house on Aug. 22, 2019. Over and over, Heide and his partner asked Weiss about giving Arroyo the $2,500 check, his business card, and copies of the legislation he wanted Link to have.
Finally, Weiss seemed to get annoyed.
“C’mon guys. You guys are trying to trap me,” he said on the recording.
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