The former ComEd vice president who secretly recorded his colleagues as part of a federal corruption probe began testifying against ex-House Speaker Michael Madigan on Tuesday, the first of what is expected to be multiple days on the stand.
One of the prosecution’s star witnesses, Fidel Marquez’s cooperation with federal investigators provided the backbone of prosecutors’ allegations that Madigan and his co-defendant Michael McClain supported ComEd-friendly legislation in exchange for benefits from the utility, such as do-nothing contracts for their associates.
Marquez began working with the FBI in early 2019, after agents confronted him at his mother’s home and played wiretapped phone calls of him that they said showed him committing crimes. He went on to make multiple undercover recordings of his own, both audio and video, and is expected to testify that ComEd paid Madigan’s favored associates hundreds of thousands of dollars for virtually no work.
“I know that they were brought on as a favor to Michael Madigan,” Marquez testified last year in the related “ComEd Four” bribery trial, which ended with convictions for McClain and three others. “For Madigan to see ComEd positively. So that he could perhaps be helpful for our legislative agenda in Springfield.”
Marquez briefly took the stand before a lunch break Tuesday to tell jurors he pleaded guilty in 2020 to conspiracy to commit bribery. In exchange for his truthful testimony, he said, prosecutors will recommend a sentence of probation instead of prison time.
He also admitted to jurors that earlier this year he incorrectly filled out an application for a gun. When the application asked whether he was under indictment or information for a felony, he said no. On the stand Tuesday, Marquez said that was inadvertent.
He simply wanted a weapon to fend off rattlesnakes near his Arizona home, he said.
Marquez is not facing charges related to that application, but Madigan and McClain’s attorneys are almost certain to use it to attack his credibility. The judge overseeing Marquez’s case warned him of that earlier this year, telling him he had basically “given a really beautiful piece of ammunition to Madigan’s lawyers.”
Marquez is expected to get into the meat of his testimony Tuesday after a lunch break.
He is one of two crucial witnesses who made undercover recordings while cooperating with federal authorities. The other, former Ald. Daniel Solis, is expected to testify later in the trial about Madigan’s alleged efforts to use his public position to get work for his private law firm. Solis, who also testified in last year’s corruption trial of ex-Ald. Edward Burke, was himself charged with bribery but got an unprecedented sweetheart deal in exchange for his cooperation.
Madigan, 82, of Chicago, who served for decades as speaker of the Illinois House and the head of the state Democratic Party, faces racketeering charges alleging he ran his state and political operations like a criminal enterprise.
Both Madigan and McClain, 77, a former ComEd contract lobbyist from downstate Quincy, have pleaded not guilty and denied wrongdoing.
jmeisner@chicagotribune.com
mcrepeau@chicagotribune.com
