http://www.afro-netizen.com/2004/11/firm_in_skyway_.html
Firm in Skyway deal linked to corruption case
By Frank Main & Fran Spielman
Staff Reporters
Chicago Sun-times
A politically connected minority-owned Chicago investment banking firm that recently won a piece of the lucrative Skyway toll road deal is at the center of a federal corruption case in Philadelphia.
Loop Capital Markets — a big donor to Illinois politicians — secretly funneled money to a Philadelphia attorney to gain business with the city of Philadelphia, according to a federal indictment there.
The indictment accuses the attorney, Ronald A. White, of bribing Philly’s then-treasurer, Corey Kemp, to steer city business to favored companies, including Loop Capital Markets. White died this month. Kemp and others are scheduled to stand trial next year.
Loop Capital Markets is not a defendant and is not formally named in the indictment. But the document lists “Company No. 4” as one of the firms that benefitted from White’s alleged wrongdoing, and the Chicago Sun-Times has identified Company No. 4 as Loop Capital Markets based on financial details in the indictment and a source close to the case.
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FBImakes Philly wiretaps public
Intelligencer, The (Doylestown, PA) - Thursday, February 17, 2005
Author: David B. Caruso The Associated Press
PHILADELPHIA - Federal prosecutors released transcripts Wednesday of more than 550 phone conversations secretly intercepted by the FBI during its investigation of public corruption in Philadelphia.
Almost all of the calls were made on phones owned by Ronald A. White , a fund-raiser for Mayor John F. Street who died in November while awaiting trial on charges that he made payoffs to the city’s treasurer in an attempt to influence government contracts.
The ex-treasurer, Corey Kemp, is scheduled to be tried next week on corruption charges, along with two executives at Commerce Bank and a millionaire Detroit businessman as well as White’s mistress.
All are accused of participating in a scheme in which city contracts were allegedly traded for political contributions, gifts, favors and payments.
Street, who has not been charged in the case, was recorded speaking to White at least three times, according to the transcripts.
In one call, White asks for Street’s help in arranging for a Chicago company, Loop Capital Markets, to receive a lucrative financial services contract. During the call, White tells Street that Loop has been “helpful.” He also reminds Street that he just arranged for $50,000 in donations to his re-election campaign, and another $17,000 for the Democratic City Committee.
“I need Loop in there,” White said.
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GREED, LIES AND AUDIOTAPES - ON TAPE, KNIGHT ADMITS FIBBING
Philadelphia Daily News (PA) - Tuesday, March 15, 2005
Author: ERIN EINHORN
ON OCT. 16, 2003, Janice Knight called her boyfriend, Ronald A. White , and informed him that she had just lied to the FBI.
Three agents had shown up at her house unexpectedly at 7 a.m. that morning and interviewed her for about an hour, agent Michael O’Brien testified yesterday in the City Hall corruption trial.
As soon as they left, Knight called White on his cell phone.
“He asked me about . . . Renee Enterprises,” Knight told White in a conversation that was recorded by FBI wiretaps.
Renee, a company owned by Knight, was registered as a vending company, but agents knew from their investigation that it had also received $30,000 in monthly “consulting” payments from a Chicago financial services company called Loop Capital Markets.
Prosecutors say the payments were a back-door way for Loop to buy White’s access to Mayor Street, former city treasurer Corey Kemp and other top city officials.
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Prosecutors then delved into Knight’s businesses, demonstrating White’s heavy involvement in both of them. They played tapes of White setting up the Renee contract with Loop , bringing it to Knight to sign, then telling Knight how to do the job.
In one conversation, White called Knight to tell her she needed to call Loop CEO Jim Reynolds to tell him that he had been moved from one bond deal to another. Knight was angry. “Am I suppose to be apologetic in my voice?” she asked. “I mean you know, am I supposed to be angry like I was fighting tooth and nail for this? Like I don’t like going in blindly the way I am.”
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Defense: Bankers broke no laws
Bucks County Courier Times (Levittown, PA) - Thursday, February 24, 2005
EXCERPT
Prosecutors said Loop Capital Markets, an Illinois-based firm, hired White’s mistress as a $5,000 per month consultant in an attempt to win his help lobbying the city.
Real estate power broker dead of apparent suicide
cnn ^ | 1/07/08 | CHICAGO, Illinois (CNN)
FROM:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2160366/posts
The body of Steven L. Good was found in his Jaguar on Monday. The car was spotted in a parking lot of a wildlife preserve in Kane County, Illinois, just outside Chicago, authorities said.
No note was found, and police say they do not know how long the 52-year-old had been in the vehicle.
Good was the chairman and chief executive officer of Sheldon Good & Co., a major U.S. real estate auction company.
... In his role as chairman of the Realtors Commercial Alliance Committee,