Tuesday, September 20, 2016

Meet Illinois’ New Chief Justice—Who Is a Main Defendant in a Federal Racketeering Lawsuit


In 2004, a little known Republican judge from southern Illinois raked in millions of dollars for an election for Illinois Supreme Court Justice. So did his Democratic opponent. My research into Karmeier’s campaign funds shows these campaign entries by a shadowy interest group, located in Washington DC: Illinois State Board of Elections, Citizens for Karmeier— contributions by JUSTPAC of $150,000 on October 12, 2004, and $186,125 on October 21, 2004, under the vendor name MPGH Agency, Inc., with an address of  700 13th Street NW Washington, DC 20005.
There were many more donations just like this.
Why did this race attract so much money? State Farm Insurance Co. donated heavily to Justice Karmier at the time it was pursuing an appeal in Avery v. State Farm.  The trial court awarded policyholders $1 billion in damages for the insurer’s fraudulent use of inferior parts to repair cars.  After Justice Karmeier was elected, he voted to overturn this ruling.
The 2004 election hounds him today. Recently, a federal judge ordered him to sit for a deposition in a RICO lawsuit against State Farm that stems from the insurer’s campaign donations.  In 2014, Justice Karmeier barely survived a bitterly contested retention election that attracted more than $2 million to attack his record.
Now, he has been elected by fellow justices to be the Chief Justice.
Compare that high achievement with this news from yesterday (September 19, 2016) (News source here. 
“An Illinois federal judge late Friday granted class certification to plaintiffs representing 4.7 million State Farm policyholders involved in a complex Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (‘RICO’) regarding an alleged scheme involving campaign contributions being poured into an Illinois Supreme Court justice’s race to influence the reversal of a $1.05 billion decision,” says a release from the Clifford Law Offices of Chicago.
According to the complaint, State Farm and related defendants allegedly “perpetrat[ed] a scheme through an enterprise specifically designed to defraud Plaintiffs and Class out of a $1.05 billion judgment.”
Per Clifford’s, “That ‘scheme’ allegedly involved the defendants orchestrating a ‘dark money’ network of campaign contributions to the campaign committee of Justice Lloyd A. Karmeier for the Illinois Supreme Court who would be sympathetic to State Farm’s position in the $1.05 billion class action, and then misleading and lying to the Court about its clandestine and sizeable involvement in contributions to Karmeier’s contested election.”
Per Clifford’s, “That ‘scheme’ allegedly involved the defendants orchestrating a ‘dark money’ network of campaign contributions to the campaign committee of Justice Lloyd A. Karmeier for the Illinois Supreme Court who would be sympathetic to State Farm’s position in the $1.05 billion class action, and then misleading and lying to the Court about its clandestine and sizeable involvement in contributions to Karmeier’s contested election.”

Avery v. State Farm involved damages to claimants’ cars being repaired with non-factory authorized or non-original equipment manufacturer or OEM parts when they were led to believe that they were factory authorized, as customer’s State Farm policies provided. The case covers a period between 1987-1998.”


Illinois has a supreme court that matches the other branches of government for low ethics.

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