CHICAGO (AP) -- A political insider testified Thursday that George Ryan's closest friend shared with him hundreds of thousands of dollars he earned by lobbying the former governor on behalf of state vendors and once said that he would also ``take care of George.''
Donald A. Udstuen said Larry Warner told him after Ryan became secretary of state in 1991 that ``a lot of people were going to do well off George's election'' and that Warner planned to be among them by lobbying his longtime friend on behalf of companies eager for state business.
Udstuen, himself the former chief lobbyist for the Illinois State Medical Society, was a key government witness as Ryan's racketeering and fraud trial wrapped up its eleventh week. Udstuen has pleaded guilty to a tax charge and is awaiting sentencing.
U.S. District Judge Rebecca R. Pallmeyer barred prosecutors from asking Udstuen what he believed Warner had meant by the words ``take care of George.''
Ryan's chief defense counsel, Dan K. Webb, told Pallmeyer that prosecutors were trying to suggest that Ryan got lobbying money from Warner when there is no evidence that such payments were ever made.
Ryan, 71, and Warner, 67, are charged in a 22-count federal indictment with racketeering, mail fraud and other offenses. The indictment says that Ryan steered big-money state contracts and leases to Warner and other members of an elite circle of politically connected friends.
It says Ryan got free vacations and assorted gifts in return.
Ryan and Warner deny that anything they did was illegal, and Ryan's attorneys say the former governor never received any payoffs from his longtime friend.
Udstuen has been one of the top Republican strategists in Illinois for more than 30 years and had been feeding advice to Ryan since he first ran for the legislature in 1972.
He said that when Warner told him shortly after Ryan's 1991 election that he was about to go into the lobbying business, Udstuen responded, ``Yeah? Great.''
He said Warner told him: ``You deserve some of this.''
``Well, maybe, but does George know about this?'' Udstuen said he replied.
``He said he talked to George and he's aware of it and he's fine,'' Udstuen testified. ``He said, 'I'll take care of George.'''
Udstuen said that he wanted a share of the money but wanted to avoid registering as a lobbyist because he was already lobbying for the Illinois State Medical Society, the political voice of the medical profession at the Statehouse in Springfield.
``It would look very strange if I were lobbying for some other group,'' he testified. He said that he ``didn't want anyone aware of what I was doing. I didn't want to register as a lobbyist for those companies'' that had signed up as Warner's clients.
He said they worked out an arrangement under which another Republican insider, Allan Drazek, agreed to receive the payments from Warner's consulting companies and forward the money to Udstuen after deducting a fee for his laundering services.
Drazek has since pleaded guilty to money laundering and is expected to be a witness.
Udstuen said the checks were made payable to Drazek's company, American Management Resources, and that a few times a year Drazek would deliver envelopes of cash to his office.
``He would hand me an envelope full of cash,'' Udstuen said. He said the practice went on for eight years. ``I put the envelope in my desk after taking some of the money out and used it for personal expenses.''
Asked how much he got, Udstuen said he believes that Warner sent $300,000 in checks and that he received more than $100,000 back from Drazek in cash.
Prosecutors produced documents that suggested the amounts forwarded by Warner to Udstuen represented a third of his fees from such state vendors as International Business Machines and American Decal. Udstuen said he was the one who got IBM as a client for Warner.
According to Udstuen, IBM lobbyist Robert Kjellander of Springfield believed that he would not have an easy time lobbying Ryan and asked Udstuen who he could get to help him with the job of persuading the secretary of state to buy a new mainframe computer from the company.
Udstuen said that he sent Kjellander to Warner, who came up with a strategy of ramming through the sale on an emergency basis. Udstuen said he helped to implement the strategy.
He said Ryan's in-house counsel, Roger Bickel, balked at approving the emergency purchase, questioning whether there was a true emergency and saying state law was strict on the subject.
``I said, 'Roger, don't give me that legal mumbo-jumbo. Just do it,'' Udstuen testified. The $25 million computer deal went to IBM not long afterward.
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