Rezko Quoted As Wanting Bribe: 'You Bet!'

CBS Radio Chicago reports:

An admitted fixer turned government witness testified Thursday that he got political fundraiser Antoin ``Tony'' Rezko to do an about face and back an $81 million hospital construction project by dangling a $1.5 million bribe and campaign money for the governor.

Millionaire attorney Stuart Levine, the government's star witness at Rezko's fraud trial, also was heard on an FBI tape recording telling a corrupt contractor that Rezko had powerful influence over Gov. Rod Blagojevich and ``can get anything done he wants done.''

Levine testified that in early 2003, Rezko opposed Mercy Health System's plan to build the $81 million hospital in McHenry County's Crystal Lake.

Prosecutors allege that could have been fatal to the plan because Rezko, a major fundraiser for Blagojevich and Sen. Barack Obama, controlled the Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board, which had life-or-death power over such projects.

Levine, who was a member of the planning board, said Rezko's turnabout came at a meeting in Rezko's office.

``I said, 'Would it make a difference if you and I could make a lot of money if Mercy got its CON?'' Levine testified Thursday, referring to the ``certificate of need'' the board must issue before any new hospital construction is launched in Illinois.

``'You bet!' or words to that effect,'' Levine quoted Rezko as saying.

That's The Chicago Way.