Another inside deal for governor's wife Brokered condo sale for state contractor By David Kidwell, John Chase and Ray Long | Tribune staff reporters November 4, 2007 1 2 next Gov. Rod Blagojevich's wife received the real estate commission in a $650,000 condominium sale from a businessman who since has won $10 million in no-bid state contracts.
The seller was Mark T. Wight, owner of Wight & Company, an architecture firm that won three new contracts with the state's toll highway authority after the 2005 sale. The buyer was John R. Wyma, Wight's tollway lobbyist and a longtime Blagojevich insider.
It is the third time the Tribune has disclosed similar commissions earned by the first lady and her home-based real estate business, revealing a steady income to the Blagojevich household from key political supporters, fundraisers and state contractors.
The governor's chief spokeswoman declined to elaborate on the deal, but said Patricia Blagojevich earned "a standard commission for her work."
Related links State's audit of firm sought A standard commission ranges from 4 percent to 6 percent, which would put her fee between $26,000 and $39,000 since she was the only real estate agent in the deal.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/servic...,6240004.story __________________
19:52 If you knew what goes on in the sausage factory, you’d run screaming into the night. Or grab your shotgun and kill some folks and then maybe yourself. I just finished a half-hour argument/debate/tutoring session with one of the most powerful people in the mainstream media. It was about Obama/Rezko. This person, in charge of many, many others, thought he knew probably all their was to know about the Obama Rezko land deal. He thought it was about a sweetheart deal over a strip of land for a driveway. He thought this because the Chicago press did a pristine job of hiding the real story from everyone, the fact that Rezko, a known buyer of political influence, which is illegal, actually bought influence with Obama by purchasing expensive land for him, not by selling him a little strip of land at a discount. The entire MSM took the Sun-Times’ voucher that they had fully vetted Rezko and Obama’s dealings, and that the False Prophet was clean. Nothing cold be further from the truth. They carefully avoided the real question, did Obama and Rezko violate the law through a conspiracy whereby Rezko would purchase land on Obama’s behalf? The fact that this person, in his position of supervising so many reporters, was as unaware of the reality of the situation as he was, stupefied me, but went a long way toward explaining why The Dark One has gotten as far as he has. And then suddenly in the conversation/argument, it was my fault. I started getting yelled at; “Why didn’t you come to me this two months ago, asshole!?” And he was right. But I was also right when I told him I was now doing a job with my own investigators that he should have been doing nine months ago. We’re now both working to get something done, although he still carries an air of thinking that nothing Obama’s done in the past matters anymore. I asked him if it mattered if it was discovered that Obama had murdered a nun. Perhaps more to the point he seemed resigned, beaten, the fight taken out of him. Too much of our leadership is suffering from this defeatist attitude, this illness, this weakness. As such, they have abdicated their responsibilities to us. Before some rays of light pierced the cloud over his head, he asked me to keep him apprised blow by blow of what my investigations yielded. He was literally handing his own job over to me, a private citizen relying on private donations, to do a job he should have been supervising so very long ago. Not one person at any major news organization has even spoken to the people that Rezko and Obama bought the land from, throughout the entire campaign. Shortly after some more back and forth screaming, he climbed aboard the bandwagon. About an hour later, stupefied, I watched Bill O’Reilly, clearly in some post-recent epiphany mode, basically repeat a newbie’s version of my end of the conversation. Like a man beginning to see the light, he spoke of the Obama/Rezko land deal as “having much more to it” and an “explosive” story. I’ve been saying this for months, and with God as my witness I swear the current President-elect would never have beaten Hillary Clinton if this had been reported when it should have. There is little investigation required to prove it. Why is this different from the myriad other scandals that this Potus-elect of shit has survived? It’s a crime, indictable, and it is the first one to demonstrate that Obama will lie, not “technically” but completely, to his own constituents, and is therefor incapable of holding their confidence. Yes everybody, the Federal Governement is no longer responsible for enforcing the Constitution by verifying the elegibility of people to be President, and the media is no longer responsible for doing the investigative reporting required for vetting Presidential candidates. Both have told us to our faces that these things are now our job. Brave new world, led by brave people, eh?http://patdollard.com/2008/12/for-sale/#comment-341516
: Who was your Realtor? Did this Realtor also represent Rita Rezko?
A: Miriam Zeltzerman, who had also represented me in the purchase of my prior property, a condominium, in Hyde Park. She did not represent Rita Rezko.
Wikipedia article says that Patti Blagojevich “was a business partner of Rezko’s for at least a decade” — she could well have been the realtor for Rezko in the Obama transactions (so that she could receive the commissions etc.) but I haven’t seen confirmation of that.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rod_Blagojevich
Tony Rezko indictment and trial
On October 11, 2006, Blagojevich fundraisers and businessmen Antonin “Tony” Rezko and Stuart Levine were indicted for participation in a scheme to obtain kickbacks from investment firms seeking business from two state boards. Levine pleaded guilty two weeks later and agreed to testify against Rezko.[63][64]
The governor’s wife, Patricia Blagojevich, was a business partner of Rezko’s for at least a decade. In 2004, she received over $38,000 in real estate commissions from him.[65]
In October 2006, it was revealed that Patricia Blagojevich, a licensed real estate broker, earned $113,700 in commissions from Anita and Amrish Mahajan. These were the only commissions earned by Patricia Blagojevich that year. Anita Mahajan owns a urinalysis company that holds a no-bid contract with the state Department of Children and Family Services. Amrish Mahajan is president of a bank that has two requests pending before state regulators to acquire two out-of-state banks.[66]
In December 2007, Blagojevich campaign boss Chris Kelly was indicted on federal charges of tax fraud.[67] The charges against Kelly were not related to the governor or any political work. However, Kelly has been listed as a “co-schemer” in court filings related to the Rezko case. According to prosecutors, Kelly was involved in pressuring prospective state contractors for “finder’s fees” or political contributions.[68] At the time of Rezko’s indictment, Blagojevich described his relationship with Kelly: “They’re two different people, by the way, and it’s a different relationship. Chris and I are much closer. Chris is the head of my political campaign. That’s someone I talk to a lot more frequently.”[69]
"Rezko had a spot in the front row at the last inauguration, when he was advising Rod Blagojevich on sensitive appointments to powerful state jobs. First Lady Patti Blagojevich was a Rezko business partner for about a decade, receiving more than $38,000 in real estate commissions from him in 2004."
Patti Blagojevich Was Business Partner of Rezko's for a Decade!!
bookmark for later reading
Look for the Michelle Obama link to Daley also. What a web we weave..............
bookmark
The Real Barack Obama website has covered this issue in very great detail extensively for months and months. See their archives at the link below. It’s all there.
http://therealbarackobama.wordpress.com/2008/10/26/obamas-rezko-house-resource-list/
No cigar on a link but some interesting things:
http://www.chicagomag.com/Radar/Deal-Estate/March-2007/Sale-of-the-Week-University-Village-home/
http://www.senategop.state.il.us/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=311&Itemid=123
http://www.cdobs.com/archive/spotlight/request-for-release-of-obamas-house-appraisal,1993/
http://www.noquarterusa.net/blog/2008/11/04/breaking-fbi-asked-questions-on-rezko-land-deal/
http://worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.printable&pageId=79390
http://www.zimbio.com/Obamamania/articles/882/Pringle+Mansion+Deal+Mutual+Bank+Anita+Amrish
http://www.bestsyndication.com/?q=20080518_curtain_time_obama_part-5.htm
http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/November-2007/Mr-Inside-Out/
This one is pretty interesting and one of the links is scrubbed;
http://www.noquarterusa.net/blog/2008/02/04/how-to-buy-a-mansion-you-cant-afford/
http://2164th.blogspot.com/2008/03/barack-obama-tony-rezko-and-nadhmi.html
Not relevant to this but interesting:
http://www.houstonpress.com/2008-02-28/news/barack-obama-screamed-at-me/5
http://rezkowatch.blogspot.com/ has been following and trying to figure out the Obama house/Rita Rezko paying for their side yard since Jan or so. They are pretty good about answering emails or comments
Bump and bookmark
Mentioned on O’Reilly last night also. . .
Did you ever determine if “Patti Blagojevich” was the realator for “Rita Rezko”? That would be very telling.
Is this the agent you’re looking for?
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/02/01/rezko/index1.html
The Obamas closed on their house in June 2005. On the same day, Rezko’s wife, Rita, purchased the vacant lot for $625,000. They later sold a portion of the lot to the Obamas, for $104,500, so the family could expand its yard. The Rezkos then paid $14,000 to build a fence along the property line.
The sale was brokered by real estate agent Donna Schwan, who’d known Rezko when he lived in the neighborhood. Asked who approached her about the house, Schwan told Salon, “I honestly don’t remember. Tony Rezko lived across the street, so he’d been interested in the lot.”
Last year, Rezko sold the vacant lot to his attorney, Michael Sreenan, who is now peddling it for $950,000.
Lots on the deal with links to documents. Maybe helpful?
http://209.157.64.200/focus/f-news/2146647/posts?page=14
http://www.gopmom.com/2008/10/clever-real-estate-strategies-for-politicians/
This was a good article about the whole sleazy deal:
http://freerepublic.com/focus/news/2026169/posts?page=9