Hastert was doing “structuring”, i.e., the federal criminal offense of splitting up bank deposits so as to keep them under a threshold such as $10,000 above which banks have to report transactions to the government.
Structuring is unlawful whether or not it occurs in conjunction with any other legal offense, as opposed to being motivated by, say, a desire to keep a low profile in general or a sentiment that the government already keeps tabs on too many innocent activities.
Nor is there any requirement that the person be aware that there is a law banning structuring; someone who gets wind that transactions over $10,000 are reportable, and decides “What’s up with that? I’ll just make $9,000 deposits”), has broken the Bank Secrecy Act.
The federal government instructs banks to report suspicious patterns of sub-threshold deposits, and not to warn customers that it is doing so.
It's his money. If he wants to give it to somebody, that's his business.
why do I seem to think history would have changed for the positive if Livingston had become speaker?
even if the change was something not particularly earth shaking.
Hastert is a big amnesty shill. He should have focussed on other issues.
Hastert was the one who made a point of defending William Jefferson, D-LA, when he was indicted. Right then I knew he was a fellow crook.
Try for Joliet, Coach. They have killer peppersteak.
Hassert was a wrestling Coach wasn’t he?
Perhaps he buggered some kid...what ever it is he wanted it kept quiet alot.
Plausibly, Hastert was paying hush money. If so, his natural line of defense is that he was a desperate victim of criminal extortion and acted without criminal intent in regard to the structuring.
What was he being blackmailed for?