The Sidebar

Carol J. Spizziri is on the right end wearing a gold necklace (source) According to Where Did the Save-A-Life Money Go? by San Diego Reader reporter Don Bauder, as of 2010 Spizzirri lived in a San Marcos mobile home park.

Click here for media reports about the Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF) scandal.

Click here for media reports about former SALF employee Annabel Melongo's efforts to expose the mess including her ongoing, wide-ranging federal civil rights lawsuit against SALF founder/president Carol J. Spizzirri (formerly of Grayslake, IL) and a number of Illinois law enforcement officials.

Carol J. Spizzirri and Rita Mullins, former mayor of Palatine, IL, and second-in-command at the tainted Save-A-Life Foundation

Via Judge John Z. Lee's March 19, 2019 Memorandum Opinion & Order in response to defendants' motions for summary judgment, Melongo's lawsuit is apparently heading to trial. Click here to download a copy.





Here's Spizzirri's May 11, 2018 deposition (entered as a plaintiff's exhibit) in which my name turns up a number of times. (Click here to download a copy.) Followers of the scandal may recall that in 2007, SALF filed a specious, failed lawsuit against me and two other defendants which I discussed in The Downfall of a Non-Profit: The Ongoing Saga of the Save A Life Foundation, a thorough 2015 article by Patch reporter/editor Tim Moran. 

Click here for plaintiff Annabel Melongo's November 15, 2014 Second Amended Complaint and other key case documents.

Click here for media reports about the Melongo case.

Click here for media reports about Carol Spizzirri and the Save-A-Life Foundation.

FBI Director James B. Comey presents 2014 Director’s Community Leadership Award to WSB-TV investigative Jodie Fleischer "for her extraordinary contributions to preventing crime and violence in the Atlanta area and throughout the state of Georgia...Ms. Fleischer further demonstrated leadership by coordinating her investigative reporting with investigative efforts of law enforcement, to include the FBI." (source)

On July 15, WSB-TV (Atlanta's ABC affiliate) aired CDC gives millions of tax dollars to shady nonprofit by investigative reporter Jodie Fleischer, the latest chapter in the $9 million Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF) scandal and the sweeping federal civil rights lawsuit filed by former SALF employee, Annabel Melongo.



Don't miss the video, but here's the takeaway:

The (U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) is refusing to answer Channel 2 Action News' questions about a high-ranking employee who served on the board of a now-defunct nonprofit that's been the subject of a series of scandals.

The Save A Life Foundation (SALF) also happened to receive more than $3 million in CDC funding, much of it while that same employee (Doug Browne of Doraville, GA) was serving as the nonprofit's treasurer.

"Save A Life was a fraud, it can't be described as anything but a total fraud," said attorney Jennifer Bonjean, who represents a whistleblower who used to work there.

The nonprofit was based in a Chicago suburb, and in its heyday, claimed to have helped teach more than a million school children various first aid techniques.

But beginning in 2006, a series of investigations by the ABC station in Chicago debunked the nonprofit's founder as a fraud.

Carol Spizzirri had claimed to be a registered nurse in her bio on the SALF website and on various grant applications; but she wasn't. She's also accused of lying about the circumstances of her daughter's tragic accident that was the motivating force behind the creation of SALF.

Screenshot from SALF's now-defunct website -- the correct spelling of Spizzirri's alleged alma mater -- also defunct -- is Mt. Senario College in Ladysmith, Wisconsin

Spizzirri was born Carol Jean Niemann and grew up in Milwaukee where in 1968, according to his 2009 affidavit, she met and married her first husband, the late Gordon T. Pratt, with whom she had three daughters and who divorced her in 1980. About seven years later, she moved to Grayslake, Illinois, with her second husband, David T. Spizzirri, who divorced her in 1993, the year she started SALF.


Around the time the IL Attorney General's investigation was made public, Spizzirri beat feat to San Marcos, California, where she and former SALF executive Scott Anderson co-own a property in a mobile home park at which Spizzirri is vice president of the residents association.

Re: the Melongo lawsuit, as I reported last month, Ms. Bonjean told me, "Carol Spizzirri has been served and I will be filing a motion for default judgement against her."

Here's proof of service from November:

  
Via SALF's year 2000 Annual Report:


Via the print edition of the San Diego Reader:


Click here for the June 16, 2015 motion of default filed against Spizzirri.

Donald J. Angelini, Jr. (source)

That apparently made Spizzirri snap to because about a month later, her Chicago attorney Donald J. Angelini, Jr. filed this motion on her behalf:



As it happens, her lawyer and I have something in common.

Both of our fathers worked the dark side of the street.

Via FBI: Mob boss on tape in McCormick Place case, an April 25, 2010 ABC7 Chicago story by investigative reporter Chuck Goudie who coincidentally (per the Atlanta CDC expose) was responsible for the "series of investigations by the ABC station in Chicago that) debunked (Spizzirri) as a fraud.":

The FBI recorded more than 50 conversations involving Chicago Outfit boss Rudy "The Chin" Fratto during an investigation of alleged bid-rigging at the city's McCormick Place.

...Fratto, 66, the leader of the Mob's Elmwood Park crew according to federal authorities, was indicted with another man last month on charges that he used inside information to score a forklift deal at McCormick Place.

...An attached affidavit from Donald Angelini, Jr., the attorney handling the sweetheart contract case, states that Fratto's defense would be "greatly hampered" if he was imprisoned and couldn't assist in the preparation.

...Angelini Jr. (is the) son of the late Mob bookmaker Don "the Wizard of Odds" Angelini....

Via Donald J. Angelini, Odds Wizard Who Ran Gambling For Chicago Mob by Cam Simpson, a December 8, 2000 obituary published by the Chicago Tribune:

Dubbed the "Wizard of Odds" in the Chicago Outfit, the name organized crime members for decades have given to the city's Mafia faction, (Donald Angelini Sr.) was viewed by authorities as one of the top money makers in Chicago crime syndicate history.

...Mr. Angelini (Sr.) pleaded guilty to federal gambling charges in 1989 and was sentenced to 21 months in prison.

Prosecutors alleged that Mr. Angelini (Sr.), along with the late Dominic Cortina, reigned as gambling czar over a $20 million per-year sports betting empire.

Mr. Angelini (Sr.) and his attorney scoffed at the government's figures, but government agents insisted their numbers may even have been conservative.

The Heimlich Institute's notorious "malariotherapy" experiments were the subject of three federal investigations (CDC, FDA, Justice Department), but my pa never did time.

However, via a 2003 Reuters story about vulnerable AIDS patients being infected with malaria, at least one expert thought he deserved to:

"If (Dr.) Heimlich is really doing this, he should be put in jail," said Mark Harrington, executive director of Treatment Action Group, an AIDS research advocacy organization.

In any event, I don't know how Spizzirri came to choose the younger Angelini to represent her, but of course everyone's entitled to hire any lawyer willing to represent them, be they Rudy "The Chin" or Carol "The Nurse."

Once a self-described guardian of our nation, now governing a San Marcos, CA, mobile home park and a key defendant in the Melongo case, Carol J. Spizzirri was the subject of a blistering 2010 San Diego Reader expose by veteran reporter Don Bauder

In Part I, I reported that, in response to motions to dismiss filed by defendants (including IL Attorney General Lisa Madigan, Cook County Sheriff, and a Schiller Park cop), federal judge John Z. Lee issued a June 9 order allowing Annabel Melongo's wide-ranging civil rights case to move forward.

source

Here's what Ms. Melongo's attorney, Jennifer Bonjean (who practices in Illinois and New York), wrote me in a June 10 e-mail response to my request for a reaction comment:

We are very pleased with the court's order. The take away is that none of the defendants, including the prosecutors, have been released at this juncture. This means that all the named defendants have to participate in discovery which will allow us to determine how this travesty of justice happened and who is fundamentally responsible. Carol Spizzirri has been served and I will be filing a motion for default judgement against her.

Via Cornell University Law School's Legal Information Institute:

In civil actions in federal court, either party may make a pre-trial motion for summary judgment. To succeed in a motion for summary judgment, a movant must show 1) that there are no disputed material issues of fact, and 2) that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.

When considering motions for summary judgment, judges view all evidence in the light most favorable to the movant's opponent. As used here, "material issues of fact" refers to any facts that could allow a fact-finder to decide against the movant. If the motion is granted, there will be no trial. The judge will immediately enter judgment for the movant.

Click here for my compilation of media reports about the Melongo case. See my previous item for Judge Lee's concise telling of what Bonjean called "this travesty of justice."

Click here for my compilation of media reports about Spizzirri and her tainted, now-defunct Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF) first aid training nonprofit, reportedly the target of an ongoing investigation for the "possible $9 million misappropriation" of federal and state funds being conducted by -- wait for it -- the office of Spizzirri's co-defendant in the lawsuit, IL Attorney General Lisa Madigan.

FYI, for about a decade my father was SALF's "medical adviser" and he had an affectionate relationship with Spizzirri until her group reportedly canned him in 2007.

ONE LAST THRILL: Spizzirri and my then 84-year-old pa perhaps doing a demonstration of mouth-to-mouth CPR at the 2005 U.S. Conference of Mayors annual conference, Washington, D.C. (video here)

Judge Lee (source)

In a 13-page order, yesterday U.S. District Court Judge John Z. Lee "(granted) in part and (denied) in part Defendants’ motions (to dismiss)." In other words, Annabel Melongo's wide-ranging civil rights lawsuit is moving forward.

Page down to view the motion. Click here to download a copy from IllinoisCorruption.net, the website tracking Annabel Melongo's 8-1/2 year struggle for justice against former Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF) president Carol J. Spizzirri and her political cronies.

Click here for my compilation of media reports about the Melongo case. Click here for my compilation of media reports about SALF and Spizzirri. Click here for photos of Spizzirri and some of her cronies.

In a subsequent item, I'll report about Judge Lee's findings, but his summary of the complicated, circuitous history is so elegant and concise, I'm copying it below. (For clarity, I've left out the citations.)

Carol Jean Spizzirri -- whose once high-flying, politically-connected Save-A-Life Foundation nonprofit is now under investigation by the IL Attorney General -- has been named as a defendant in a sweeping federal civil rights lawsuit filed by attorney Jennifer Bonjean on behalf of her client Annabel Melongo

For those interested in political corruption and abuse of the legal system by public officials, the 26-page complaint, filed November 5 in U.S. District Court in Chicago, makes for lively reading.

Click here to download a copy or page down to view.

Via the San Diego Reader

To read about the sordid history of Spizzirri (who per the complaint, now lives in San Marcos, California) and her tainted organization, don't miss Where Did the Save-A-Life Money Go? by Don Bauder, San Diego Reader, November 17, 2010.

A few weeks ago, the office of the IL Attorney General confirmed to me in writing that their investigation of SALF, which started in July 2010, is ongoing.

For more details, see Illinois senator seeks answers on possible $9 million misappropriation by Erin Murphy, Dubuque Telegraph Herald, June 26, 2013.

From an e-mail I just received from Annabel Melongo's attorney, Jennifer Bonjean (slightly edited for clarity):

Today Cook County Judge Joseph Joyce entered a directed finding in favor of Annabel. After 8 years, the State's case came down to a single allegation that Annabel accessed Carol Spizzirri's email and forwarded an email to herself. And they couldn't even prove that. It Is a text book example of the State failing to exercise its discretion and adhere to its duty to seek truth. We are all indebted to Annabel Melongo for having the courage to hold the State to its burden. She took enormous risk and we are all better off for it. 

Even if you're new to the case, three words of advice: READ THIS MOTION.

In days to come, I plan to blog about specific sections of the motion, which was filed on June 25, 2014 by attorney Jennifer Bonjean re: the computer tampering charges filed against her client, Annabel Melongo, about eight years ago by Cook County, IL. To direct download a copy of the motion, click here.

Click here for a compilation of media reports about the Melongo case posted on my web site -- the first is a March 14, 2012 interview I did with a Rockford, IL, newspaper that includes the history of the computer tampering allegations which originated with Save-A- Life Foundation (SALF) founder/president Carol J. Spizzirri, a former politically-connected media darling in Chicago who now lives in a trailer park in San Marcos, CA. Click here for a compilation of media reports about SALF and Spizzirri.

Still of Annabel Melongo via the November 7-8, 2012 investigative report, Jailed For Recording Law Enforcement Parts I & 2 by Patrick Fazio, NBC2 Terre Haute, IN

Last year The Sidebar was first to report Annabel Melongo's federal lawsuit against Cook County State's Attorneys, Sheriff Tom Dart, and other county officials.

Looks like I'm first again with the amended complaint filed yesterday by Melongo and her attorney Jennifer Bonjean which includes the complete timeline of the case, including the almost two years she spent in jail for posting recordings of benign phone conversations on the Internet, the result of being prosecuted under a statute that has been overturned as unconstitutional by the IL Supreme Court.

The 21-page document also details the roles of Carol J. Spizzirri and her Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF); the organization's relationships with current Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky, and former U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman; ABC7 reporter Chuck Goudie's SALF exposes; the $9 million in tax dollars awarded to SALF; and much more.

Page down to view. Click here to download a copy.

(Circa 2005) Front row: former SALF Director of Communications Ciprina Spizzirri and her mother, Carol J. Spizzirri; Back row: former Maywood, IL mayor Ralph Conner,* former Palatine, IL mayor Rita Mullins, former SALF Public Affairs Representative Dane Neal

The complaint also takes aim at the felony computer tampering charges filed by Spizzirri against Melongo on October 31, 2006. Almost eight years later, that case appears to be headed to court, according to the website tracking Melongo's cases (click and page down).

If/when that case goes to trial, presumably Spizzirri -- who reportedly now lives in a mobile home park in San Marcos, California -- will be obligated to testify.

Click here for a compilation of media reports about the Melongo case.

Click here for a compilation of media reports about Spizzirri and SALF.





* 7/4/14 update: A previous version of this item identified former SALF Operations Director Vince Davis as the cowboy wearing the duster coat in the photo. Yesterday I received an e-mail from Davis -- seen in the video clip below escorting Carol Spizzirri when she freaks out and flees the room mid-interview -- informing me that Mayor Conner (who died in 2010) dressed up as the cowboy. 

I regret the error and I appreciate Davis -- whose June 10, 2007 e-mail about U.S. Sen. Barack Obama helping to fund SALF (see below) -- was reported in a June 25, 2013 Dubuque Telegraph Herald article -- bringing it to my attention -- PMH

Via an article by reporter Jack Bouboushian in yesterday's Courthouse News Service:

The (Illinois Supreme Court) is considering the constitutionality of the (IL eavesdropping) law after a woman prosecuted under it was incarcerated for over 18 months before her trial ended with a hung jury.

Annabel Melongo was once an employee of the Save-A-Life Foundation, an Illinois charity that has been accused of dishonesty or financial impropriety. After secretly recording her phone conversations with a Cook County court reporter and posting those tapes on a personal website, she was charged in 2010 with violating the Illinois Eavesdropping Act, a law that requires a person to obtain the consent of anyone whose conversation he records.

A judge ultimately found for Melonga in her civil suit against the state, leading the Illinois Supreme Court to hold oral arguments today on the state's appeal.

...The ACLU of Illinois came down in an amicus brief squarely on the side of Melongo, who filed her brief with the high court on Dec. 6.
     
...An opening and reply brief are also available from Illinois. Melongo meanwhile is also suing the state in federal court for violations of her civil rights.

(First reported by The Sidebar, click here for a copy of Melongo's federal lawsuit.)

The Supreme Court's website posted video and audio versions of yesterday's hearing.

Here's a copy of the video I found on YouTube (with some minimal added graphic identifiers). It begins with Cook County Assistant State's Attorney's Alan Spellberg presenting the state's case. At time stamp 18:30, attorney Gabriel Plotkin of the Chicago law firm Miller Shakman and Beem LLP presents his argument on behalf of Ms. Melongo.




From an unsigned e-mail I received this morning identified only as originating from "Team Melongo":

The courtroom was so packed that some people had to watch the hearing in a screen at an adjacent room.

What's next? This morning I asked Gabriel Plotkin, who responded:

The next step is to wait for a written opinion from the Supreme Court. That will certainly take weeks, and likely months.

Any attorneys or legal experts out there want to share your thoughts for possible publication, signed or unsigned?

If so, feel free to e-mail me.

source

"After stinging defeat, Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez is appealing judge's dismissal of eavesdropping charges against Chicago woman jailed 20 months for recording a few phone calls."

That was the headline of an August 9, 2012 Sidebar article.

The sting was that a powerful prosecutor with vast resources was legally bested by Annabel Melongo, a near-destitute woman with no formal legal training, who represented herself in the case.

Today I learned that in a few weeks the State's appeal of the lower court judge's dismissal of the charges -- on the grounds that the IL Eavesdropping Act is unconstitutional -- is scheduled to be heard by the Illinois Supreme Court.

But this time around, Melongo's not on her own.

Gabriel Plotkin (source)

This afternoon Gabriel Plotkin of the Chicago law firm Miller Shakman and Beem told me he and his colleagues will be representing Melongo and arguing on her behalf in front of the Supreme Court.

Click here to download the 60-page Defendant-Appellee brief filed December 6 on her behalf.

Click here to download the Plaintiff-Appellant brief filed by IL Attorney General Lisa Madigan and Alvarez.

And earlier this month, the Chicago office of the American Civil Liberties Union filed a friend of the court brief on behalf of Melongo. Page down to view; click here to download a copy.

According to documents posted on IllinoisCorruption.net, the website tracking Melongo's case, the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear her team's oral argument on January 14th at 9.30am at the Michael A. Bilandic Building, 18th floor, at 160 N. LaSalle Street in Chicago.

(According to the court schedule, the Supreme Court Building in downstate Springfield is being renovated during January, so perhaps some Chicago reporters will show up.)

Finally, as I reported last week, a federal civil rights lawsuit was filed in July against Alvarez, IL Attorney General Lisa Madigan, Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart, and other county justice system employees by Melongo, who per the complaint filed in the case, "endured extraordinary hardships and underwent incalculable loss, pain and humiliation for which she's now seeking redress."

Annabel Melongo of Chicago, who since 2006 has been fighting a string of dubious criminal charges, is kicking back in federal court with a wide-ranging civil rights lawsuit.

As Sidebar readers know, Melongo's troubles began in October 2006 when she was arrested for allegedly destroying the computer files of the nonprofit Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF), whose employment she'd left months before.

Two weeks after her arrest, SALF was the subject of the first of dozens of broadcast and print exposes. And since 2010 SALF has reportedly been under investigation by the IL Attorney General for the "possible $9 million misappropriation" of federal and state funds.

Melongo filed her federal case in July, but I only got wind of it today via IllinoisCorruption.net, a website that chronicles her legal travails, including, per reporter Mark Guarino in the Christian Science Monitor, a 20-month jail stretch "for recording phone conversations with a county clerk."

Except for two sentences in a Sun-Times column by Carol Marin and an interview I did last year with a Rockford print weekly, Melongo's plight has been completely ignored by Illinois media.

Meanwhile, the NBC affiliate in Terre Haute, Indiana, thought her case was worth a two-night investigative report and the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press has also been on the story.

Annabel K. Melongo screenshot from NBC2 Terre Haute I-Team report

It's a complicated case that's been going on for over seven years, but the federal complaint includes a very readable blow-by-blow description. Click here to download a copy.

Here's the bare bones:


Per the case docket (accessed December 12), here's her attorney (a partner at Jones Day's Chicago office):






This item has been updated.

Vincent Davis and my father, Dr. Henry J. Heimlich

A story by reporter Erin Murphy in last week's Dubuque (IA) Telegraph Herald, Email links Obama to embattled nonprofit, broke some interesting new ground in the ongoing Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF) scandal about the once high-flying, politically-connected organization now under investigation by the Illinois Attorney General.

Before getting to that, check out this clip from The Maneuver Part I, the November 2006 ABC7 Chicago expose by investigative reporter Chuck Goudie that first pried the lid off the SALF can of worms:



The big fella who leads SALF founder/president out of the room and tells the ABC7 crew to "show yourselves out" was Vincent Davis, SALF's "Director of Operations and Military Affairs."

Here's an e-mail Davis received from Eric Brandmeyer, who for years was involved with SALF. The date is about a week after Goudie's fourth and (so far) last ABC Chicago report about SALF aired on May 30, 2007. ("Carrie" is undoubtedly Carrie Viehweg of Staunton, IL, who ran SALF's Springfield office.)

And Davis's response: 

Imagine my surprise to find myself and Chuck Goudie being trashed by Davis as he assures Brandmeyer that Mr. Obama, then a United States Senator, will be shoring up SALF's finances!

As for Davis's June 2007 prediction that Goudie "will likely be out of a job soon," six years later, according to his LinkedIn:


Meanwhile, six months later, via Davis's LinkedIn:



Interestingly, Davis's "Obama e-mail" came to light courtesy of a June 19, 2013 subpoena filed by the defense in the Cook County Criminal Court case, Illinois v. Annabel Melongo, the former SALF employee who in October 2006 was charged with tampering with SALF's computer files after she left the company.

As it happens, the subpoena was issued to ABC7 Chicago (WLS-TV).

Patrick Fazio (source)

This week, NBC2 in Terre Haute, Indiana, broadcast a strong two-part story by investigative reporter Patrick Fazio about the Illinois Eavesdropping Act and the Annabel Melongo case, arguably the most extreme application of the controversial statute.

Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez -- whose office's six-year prosecution of Melongo resulted in a July article by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press -- refused to be interviewed.

Click here to view Part I on NBC2's website.

As NBC 2 has investigated for the past year and a half, citizens have faced felony charges for recording audio of law enforcement.

Now we've found an Illinois woman who's actually spent time behind bars because of the state's eavesdropping law.

Annabel Melongo was arrested and jailed for more than a year and a half for recording her conversations with an on-duty law enforcement official.

For the first time ever, Melongo is talking about being locked up for recording possible government corruption.

The first segment also reported that the eavesdropping case grew out of previous charges filed against Melongo in 2006 for allegedly destroying computer files of the Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF).

A politically-connected Chicago nonprofit that reportedly obtained almost $9 million in federal and state funds, SALF has since been the subject of dozens of media exposes and has been under investigation by the Illinois Attorney General since 2010.    

Click here to view Part II of Fazio's report which tags Anita Alvarez for selective enforcement of Illinois law.

The high-profile Cook County State's Attorney is apparently camera-shy about the Melongo case. She refused to be interviewed. 

Here are the two segments stitched together:



To date, no Chicago mainstream media outlet has reported about the Melongo case.

According to Mapquest, Terre Haute's about 200 miles south of the Second City.

Lucky for those interested in her case, Patrick Fazio and his NBC2 crew were willing to make the drive.

Source

Last week, two news outlets outside of Illinois reported that Cook County Circuit Court Judge Stephen Goebel had dismissed eavesdropping charges filed against Annabel Melongo on the grounds that the controversial Illinois Eavesdropping Act is unconstitutional.

Melongo spent about 20 months in Cook County Jail while awaiting trial on charges that she recorded a few routine phone conversations with a court reporter named Pamela Taylor and uploaded them to a website.

Click here to listen to the recordings.

According to a letter I received yesterday, Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez is appealing Judge Goebel's decision.

Cook County State's Attorneys Paul Castiglione, Anita Alvarez, and Alan Spellberg (source)

The information came in response to a FOIA request I submitted for records associated with the case.

Via a letter from Paul Castiglione, an Assistant Cook County State's Attorney:

  

Amanda Simmons

What else has been going on with the Melongo case?

From Ill. judge declares state's eavesdropping law unconstitutional by Amanda Simmons, Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, July 30, 2012 (my emphasis):

An Illinois judge ruled last week that the state’s eavesdropping law – one of the broadest restrictions on audio recording in the nation – is unconstitutional.

The decision granted a request for dismissal made by Annabel K. Melongo, a 39-year old woman who faced criminal charges under the Illinois Eavesdropping Act. The controversial law criminalizes the audio recording of any communication without the consent of all parties involved, regardless of whether the conversation was intended to be private. Melongo, who is representing herself in court, recorded three phone calls with a clerk at the Cook County Court Reporter’s office in Illinois without consent and posted them on her watchdog website in 2010, incurring six charges of eavesdropping.

...Unable to post bail for a bond initially set at $500,000 and later reduced to $300,000, Melongo spent about 20 months in a Cook County jail and another four months under house arrest. She said the punishment made her "the defendant with the harshest punishment for the eavesdropping law in Cook County, if not in Illinois."

Originally from Cameroon, Melongo speaks English as her third language....

In other words, Ms. Melongo -- an immigrant without a law degree who speaks imperfect English (I've talked with her) -- just handed Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez a stinging defeat.

Heads up, Lori Yokoyama and Christopher Cooper, who reportedly are going after Alvarez's job this November. 

How about the media? Are they paying attention?

Patrick Fazio (source)

At least one reporter is. Patrick Fazio at the NBC affiliate in Terre Haute, Indiana, reported the story on August 2 (and linked to a Sidebar item). Click here for the video:

Another judge has ruled the Illinois Eavesdropping Law unconstitutional.

The decision came down last week in favor of Annabel Melongo of Chicago who recorded her phone calls with a government official.

The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press says Melongo had spent over a year and half in jail on the eavesdropping charges because she couldn't afford bail.

If any Illinois media -- print, broadcast, blogs -- have reported the story, I can't find the links.

In fact, the only other mainstream media report that has ever been reported about the Melongo case is an interview I gave to a Rockford, IL print weekly in March.

It's not that Illinois reporters are unaware of all this. You should see my e-mail "sent" folder.

Someday maybe you will.

So how much money has this absurd, abusive prosecution -- which the State's Attorney took up in 2006 and which will now be dragging on via an appeal -- cost cash-strapped Illinois taxpayers?

Months ago I asked Anita Alvarez's media rep that question.

He promised to get back to me with an answer.

I'm still waiting.





This item has been slightly revised.