Lawsuit: Big Campaign Donors To Mendoza, Solis Engaged In ‘Sham’

WBEZ reports:

Businesses that gave tens of thousands of dollars last year to Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza’s political fund allegedly are “front companies” in an ongoing, multimillion-dollar “sham” involving profits from a state program, according to a pending federal civil lawsuit.

Investors in a Chicago firm called Vendor Assistance Program LLC filed the suit last year in Philadelphia. They claim their partners in VAP hid money in shell companies in Florida and Puerto Rico to avoid giving them their fair share of profits from a highly lucrative arrangement with the state of Illinois.

VAP was started in 2010 by Brian Hynes, a politically connected lawyer who’s now a central figure in a widening City Hall corruption scandal. Hynes is a longtime supporter of embattled Ald. Danny Solis (25th Ward) and co-founded VAP with Solis’ sister Patti Solis Doyle. As Illinois’ fiscal woes have deepened, the company has profited from a state initiative to speed payments to government vendors who are owed money.

Last month, WBEZ reported that Mendoza — who is running for Chicago mayor in the Feb. 26 election — gave away nearly $74,000 in campaign contributions from Solis-controlled political funds and another $67,650 that she got last year from five companies set up by VAP investors, including Hynes.

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