Former Chicago Ald. Edward Vrdolyak has been released early from federal prison after serving about five months of his 18-month sentence for a tax-related conviction.
Vrdolyak, 84, had been housed at the federal medical prison in Rochester, Minnesota since late November. As of Friday, his location was listed on the U.S. Bureau of Prisons web site at a halfway house in Downers Grove.
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Given Vrodlyak’s age and ill health, it’s likely he’s serving out the rest of his sentence on some form of home detention, though still under the jurisdiction of the prison bureau. His sentence is scheduled to conclude in March 2023.
A BOP spokesman could not immediately be reached Friday, and Vrodolyak’s attorney did not respond to a request for comment.
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Vrdolyak, a former Chicago political powerhouse and twice-convicted felon, reported to prison on Nov. 30 to begin serving his sentence stemming from millions of dollars in legal fees he and a colleague reaped in the state’s massive settlement with the tobacco companies in the 1990s.
In January, just a few weeks after his arrival, Vrdolyak’s attorneys filed an emergency petition asking U.S. District Judge Robert Dow to order his release, citing the former alderman’s advanced age, rapidly declining health and susceptibility the surging omicron variant of COVID-19.
Prosecutors objected, saying that Vrdolyak was receiving top-notch medical care in prison and that efforts to win release, which began with a request to the U.S. Bureau of Prisons the day after he reported, showed a “remarkable display of white collar criminal privilege.”
“The government has no doubt that prison life is tough on the defendant and his family,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Amarjeet Bhachu wrote in a filing in January. “But time in prison is not meant to be a walk in the park.”
In denying early release in March, Dow noted that Vrdolyak would be eligible to petition the Bureau of Prisons for release to home confinement once he’s completed 25% of his sentence, which would have been mid-April.
Vrdolyak pleaded guilty in March 2019 to a tax charge alleging he obstructed an IRS investigation into payments to and from his friend and associate Daniel Soso related to the state’s $9.3 billion settlement with tobacco companies in the late 1990s.
In asking for prison time, prosecutors said Vrdolyak had been paid at least $12 million in fees stemming from the settlement even though he did no legal work on the case and hid his involvement from the Illinois attorney general.
Vrdolyak’s lawyers argued that his cut from the tobacco deal was a legitimately earned consulting fee paid by a law firm that had sought his expertise and assistance.
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Soso, 70, a lawyer and former Chicago cop, pleaded guilty in 2019 to one count of income tax evasion for failing to report more than $3 million in income in the deal. He was sentenced in March 2020 to 2 years in prison.
