‘I don’t recall’: Prosecutors reach heart of allegations in intrigue-filled perjury trial of Tim Mapes, longtime Madigan aide

CHICAGO — After five days of testimony featuring multiple layers of political intrigue, the perjury trial of Tim Mapes on Wednesday finally got to the rather simple allegations at the heart of the case: his alleged lies to a federal grand jury investigating his former boss, Democratic House Speaker Michael Madigan.

In a nearly 90-minute segment of Mapes’ grand jury testimony played in court, Mapes repeatedly claimed to have no recollection of “assignments” or other roles that the speaker’s longtime confidant, Michael McClain, played in the organization.

Even though Mapes, who served as Madigan’s chief of staff and executive director of the state Democratic Party, was known for his meticulous, details-driven style, he couldn’t remember talking to McClain about the transfer of a parcel of land in Chinatown at the heart of the investigation.

He seemed clueless as to how his name came up for a potential lobbying job with ComEd. And he had only a vague recollection of whom he may have talked to about a bizarre coffee klatch with the FBI at a Springfield cafe in January 2019.

Mapes continued to say he couldn’t recall specifics even after a prosecutor repeatedly warned him that he could be charged with perjury if the grand jury had reason to believe he actually did remember.

“So there is no doubt in your mind that you could be prosecuted for perjury if the grand jury concludes that when you fail to recall something or you say I don’t remember something, if they conclude that you are lying?” Assistant U.S. Attorney Amarjeet Bhachu asked at one point during the March 31, 2021, session.

“Yes, sir,” Mapes replied.

Proving someone is lying about their memory can be tricky. In Mapes’ case, however, prosecutors followed up the grand jury statements with wiretapped recordings of Mapes talking directly with McClain about assignments he’d received from the speaker — including Chinatown — as well as how he’d talked directly to Madigan’s chief criminal defense attorney about the encounter with the FBI.

“He was a little surprised that they were doing this in Springfield,” Mapes said on the Feb. 15, 2019, call. “So, um, anyways, I’m reporting back in.”

Mapes, 68, of Springfield, is charged with perjury and attempted obstruction of justice, accused in an indictment of lying in his answers to seven questions during his grand jury appearance. The latter charge calls for up to 20 years in federal prison, while lying to a grand jury carries a five-year maximum prison sentence.

Mapes has denied making any false statements, and his attorneys have argued that he did his “level best” to provide truthful answers. They also accused prosecutors of asking open-ended questions and failing to provide Mapes with any corroborating materials that might refresh his recollection of years-old conversations.

Either way, Mapes’ allegedly misleading statements had little effect, as Madigan and McClain were both indicted on racketeering charges last year alleging Madigan was at the top of a criminal enterprise aimed at enriching him and his cronies and maintaining his nearly unfettered political power.

McClain is also awaiting sentencing for his conviction on related charges that he participated in a scheme by Commonwealth Edison to funnel hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments to Madigan associates in order to win the speaker’s support for the utility’s legislative agenda in Springfield.

While the indictment against Mapes may be relatively simple, the political intrigue surrounding his trial has so far been multilayered.

The theater continued Wednesday as prosecutors, in an effort to prove that Mapes was lying about his lack of recall, took the jury on a deep dive into a series of secretly recorded phone calls and meetings between Madigan and members of his inner circle.

In one call from June 21, 2018, McClain worried aloud of a “Keystone Cops” atmosphere in the Madigan-run state Democratic Party given Mapes’ sudden ouster that month from Madigan’s political and government operations over sexual harassment and bullying allegations made by a staffer.

The upheaval took place in the midst of the campaign pitting Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner against Democrat J.B. Pritzker, and Mapes and McClain were clearly worried on the call about the upcoming election — as well as Madigan’s political and physical well-being.

“He looks exhausted, Tim,” McClain said.

Mapes replied that Madigan had lost a lot of weight. “He’s gotta be exhausted,” Mapes said.

The detailed discussion also included talk about how to fill in new Democratic loyalists taking over fundraising tasks for House Democratic races.

McClain told Mapes that the wheels had come off the fundraising cart after he left, particularly because Mapes was the keeper of a “comprehensive” fundraising Excel list that they relied on during campaign season.

“I have it on a thumb drive,” Mapes said, laughing. “I carry it with me all the time.”

“Oh do you? That’s pretty cute,” McClain replied.

The two also talked about the decline of Madigan’s 13th Ward power base, worrying specifically about Chicago Ald. Marty Quinn, one of Madigan’s closest allies, and whether he’d be able to send his kids to college.

“Once Madigan is gone, Marty gets defeated by the Latinos in the next election,” McClain told Mapes, who agreed.

“I’m not anti, I just think he should be taken care of, or find where he’s going to land,” Mapes said about Quinn. “He’s got three girls to get to college.”

Quinn has since been reelected twice, in 2019 and in a newly drawn district earlier this year.

Prosecutors also played a separate wiretap in which McClain and Mapes went into intricate details of multiple House maneuvers and how to set up House Democratic committees for Madigan months after Mapes’ departure — a direct attempt to undermine Mapes’ grand jury testimony that he had nothing to do with the House after Madigan shut him out.

The series of one-on-one calls between Mapes and McClain gave prosecutors fodder to undermine Mapes’ argument that he didn’t know about McClain performing assignments for Madigan — as well as numerous times in which he gave vague answers that all but defied common knowledge in Springfield.

Late Wednesday, the prosecution called former state Rep. Lou Lang, a longtime member of Madigan’s leadership team who knew all three men.

“It was fairly well known around the Capitol that Mr. McClain, aside from his lobbying duties, because he was a professional lobbyist, contacted people on the speaker’s behalf,” said Lang, who was given a “non-target” letter by prosecutors in advance of his testimony.

Lang also said the speaker “relied on Mr. Mapes for all things.”

“I know you’ve heard the phrase he kept the trains running on time and that’s what he did,” Lang said.

Asked by Assistant U.S. Attorney Julia Schwartz what Mapes’ attention to detail was like, Lang said, “Meticulous.”

Prosecutors on Thursday are expected to play calls from May 2018 where Mapes and McClain discuss Lang’s alleged harassment of a female activist.

“Let me put you on with the boss. OK?” Mapes told McClain, according to court records detailing the conversation. “So you’re going to inform him what you know and go from there.”

Prosecutors wrote in a recent court filing the episode demonstrates “as clear as day that Mapes knew McClain communicated with Madigan in 2018, because “Mapes sets up that conversation.”

Just days after the call, Mapes lost his public positions as Madigan’s chief of staff and House clerk when a staffer accused him of harassment over several years and fostering “a culture of sexism, harassment and bullying that creates an extremely difficult working environment.”

Lang is the latest in a string of former Madigan insiders to testify against Mapes including Madigan’s former political director, Will Cousineau, and state Rep. Bob Rita, a Blue Island Democrat who told the jury last week about Mapes’ allegedly close relationship with McClain.

One of the recorded conversations played Wednesday captured McClain telling Mapes about Madigan getting upset at a legislative inspector general report looking into allegations that Rita had put up a phony candidate in a campaign to help increase his chances of winning.

McClain told Mapes on the call that Madigan “just blasts the hell out of it” because the inspector general’s role should be focused on a House lawmaker’s legislative activities rather than campaign issues.

The issue may have held particular resonance with Madigan at that time because he was involved in a federal lawsuit that alleged he put up sham candidates in his 2016 primary. He eventually won the case.

On top of the wiretaps, the playing of Mapes’ March 2021 testimony before the grand jury has offered a rare public glimpse into normally secret proceedings and lifted the veil on a key manner in which large-scale criminal investigations proceed.

And given that Mapes was a key member of Madigan’s inner circle who for years served as the speaker’s borderline-tyrannical gatekeeper, what he had to say in his grand jury testimony has been of keen interest to many Illinois power brokers.

The segment played for the jury on Wednesday included all seven of the answers that are alleged in the indictment to be lies.

One came after Bhachu asked Mapes, “Do you recall anyone ever describing any work or assignments McClain was performing on Madigan’s behalf?

“I don’t recall that — that I would have been part of any of that dialogue,” Mapes answered. “I don’t know why I would be.”

Later, Bhachu stressed that investigators were particularly interested in any jobs, whether paid or unpaid, that McClain did for the speaker after he retired from lobbying in 2016. Mapes again insisted he knew nothing about it, and had no idea who else might have such information.

“I don’t know who you would go to other than Madigan and McClain,” Mapes said. “Madigan, if he had people do things for him like I did things for him, was, (he) didn’t distribute information freely.”

“The answer is yes or no to that question,” Bhachu said testily. “Do you recall?”

“No, I don’t recall any of that,” Mapes replied.

Before the grand jury, Mapes was also asked about the ouster of Madigan lieutenant Kevin Quinn, the brother of Ald. Quinn, who was accused of sending campaign worker Alaina Hampton a relentless string of text messages in which he sought to go out with her, telling her in one message that he saw her in a bikini on a Facebook post and thought she looked “smoking hot.”

The Tribune first reported the extent of the scandal in February 2018. Hampton then held a news conference and accused Madigan and his team of blackballing her from his organization for calling out Kevin Quinn. She later settled a lawsuit with Madigan-controlled political funds and still works on her own as a campaign operative.

The Hampton scandal became the flashpoint for Madigan because the speaker wound up separating himself from a series of misbehaving allies as 2018 became a year of reckoning for the #MeToo movement in Springfield.

Prosecutors introduced evidence of numerous discussions involving Mapes, McClain and others to address how to protect Madigan from losing his speakership over his handling of sexual harassment and the mistreatment of women in Springfield.

Despite the intensity of the sexual harassment issue, Mapes gave a relatively vanilla explanation when asked in the grand jury about the circumstances of Kevin Quinn’s ouster.

“A former campaign operative ... was making allegations that he had texted her profusely a number of times and she filed a complaint,” Mapes testified.

When asked, he said he couldn’t remember Hampton’s name.

Earlier Wednesday, Cousineau choked up in his second day on the stand when Mapes attorney Andrew Porter asked how difficult it was on Mapes when he abruptly departed from Madigan’s office.

“Do you believe that leaving was hard on him?” Porter asked.

“I would agree with that, yes,” Cousineau said in a voice barely above a whisper.

Cousineau had also become emotional on Tuesday when asked about Mapes remembering to reach out to him on his birthday and anniversary.

Porter leaned on the side of a podium in front of the witness stand as he asked Cousineau whether he believed Mapes was honest.

“Generally, when I worked for him, I felt he was honest during that time,” Cousineau said.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Diane MacArthur countered with a question that zeroed in on the perjury allegation, asking whether Cousineau had been present in the grand jury hearing when Mapes allegedly lied.

“I was not,” Cousineau replied.

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