New charges may be aimed at E.C. City Hall
EAST CHICAGO: U.S. attorney continues probes in Operation Restore Integrity
NWI Times
Aug 13, 2004
nwitimes.com/news/local/new-charges-may-be-aimed-at-e-c-city-hall/article_9d942f18-78ca-500c-9eb0-9fe6945ec789.html
HAMMOND -- U.S. Attorney Joseph Van Bokkelen is preparing public corruption charges he will announce today that reportedly center on East Chicago.
A source close to the investigation said multiple defendants will be named at a news conference in the federal courthouse.
While Mayor Robert Pastrick isn't accused of wrongdoing or expected to be indicted Friday, federal grand juries have hammered his circle of political allies and advisers, including former adviser James H. Fife III last week on tax fraud charges.
Interim East Chicago Police Chief Edward Samuels was charged last month in ghost-employment allegations that he billed an off-duty employer for security work he didn't perform and lied to the FBI and the U.S. District Bankruptcy Court about his income and gambling losses. Samuels is pleading not guilty.
Sources within the city Police Department complained afterward there were other high-ranking officers more deserving of punishment than Samuels for taking money for do-nothing security contracts within the city.
Seven other City Council members and department heads await trial on charges they colluded to provide free new sidewalks, driveways and tree-trimming to residents in return for their votes for the re-election of Pastrick and his allies in the 1999 Democratic primary. All are pleading not guilty.
There also is speculation Van Bokkelen may continue down a new path Operation Restore Public Integrity took last week with the indictment of Deborah Riga, a former Schererville Town Court judge.
Riga is pleading not guilty to charges she set up a driving school for traffic violators and a counseling service for teen offenders and then embezzled more than $30,000 in fees paid to attended the programs. State law and judicial canons forbid judges to profit from their courts beyond their fixed salaries.
Riga allegedly concealed the scheme by creating a company, Diversified Educational Service, and having her father, Anthony Riga, persuade a family friend to open a bank account under that name. She is accused of funneling program fees into that account and withdrawing it for living expenses and for her re-election campaign last year. Neither Anthony Riga nor the family friend was charged with wrongdoing.
She also is accused of extorting money from Nancy Fromm, president of Addiction and Family Care, a politically connected counseling service that does work for Schererville and a number of Lake County courts.
Fromm told authorities she was forced to pay Riga's father $2,000 under the guise of his being a consultant. Riga's father wasn't named in that indictment.
Fromm's appearance as a cooperating witness for the government has stirred talk she might provide evidence of other fraudulent activity. A source close to the investigation said the government has concluded she did nothing wrong in the Riga case.
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