Supreme Court puzzles over corruption definition in bribery law at center of Madigan trial: 'Is it a sin?'

Skeptical Supreme Court justices grilled a government lawyer for more than an hour Monday about a law used in the prosecution of former Illinois House Speaker Michael J. Madigan and others in Chicago, pressing her for a clearer definition of corruption.

“Is it a sin?” Justice Neil Gorsuch asked as he drilled down into the question. “Are we now talking about something that, you know, would be a venial sin? Or does it have to be a mortal one?”

Some of the justices, including Gorsuch, seemed intent on clarifying the law in question — a bribery statute that applies to state and local officials.

The case before the nation’s high court Monday was not Madigan’s, but the corruption case against James Snyder, a former mayor of Portage, Indiana. The justices acknowledged their decision in the case will have implications for prosecutions across the country, though.

The judge presiding over Madigan’s case in Chicago delayed the trial of the indicted former speaker until October to see how the Supreme Court rules in the Snyder matter. Seven of the 23 counts in Madigan’s indictment involve the law in question.

A second judge put sentencing hearings on hold in the related bribery conspiracy case against ex-ComEd CEO Anne Pramaggiore and three others. Five of the counts in that case involve the law before the high court.

The arguments Monday included repeated references to the Harry & David boutique gift store and The Cheesecake Factory — as well as to Al Capone and Illinois corruption — as the justices played with hypotheticals to determine what crosses the line between corruption and an innocuous reward.

“I don’t know where, on the Harry & David menu, the gift becomes corrupt,” Lisa Blatt, Snyder’s attorney, told the justices.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor at one point acknowledged her head was “spinning” listening to the arguments. And Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said she was “confused” after the debate zeroed in on the definition of corruption — which had not been formally identified as the day’s key question.

But on the whole, it seemed the high court was poised to further limit prosecutors in their pursuit of public corruption.

Ashlee Rezin | Sun-Times file

The question raised to the court was whether a law used to prosecute state and local officials for bribery also criminalizes something called a “gratuity.”

Snyder accepted $13,000 from a trucking company after he helped engineer contracts with his city in the company’s favor. A jury later convicted him of “corrupt solicitation.” Snyder’s attorneys say he did not approach the company for money “until after Portage awarded the contracts,” so there was no quid pro quo.

Unlike classic quid pro quo bribery, a gratuity is a reward given “corruptly” — but without a quid pro quo — for an official act that has usually already happened.

Minutes into the argument by Assistant Solicitor General Colleen Sinzdak, though, Justice Brett Kavanaugh told her she had a problem: “What does ‘corruptly’ mean?”

“What is innocuous and what is not?” Kavanaugh asked. “And, just as important, how is the official supposed to know ahead of time, ‘Oh, the $100 gift certificate is OK, but the larger one is not?’”

J. Scott Applewhite/AP Photos

Sinzdak repeatedly told the justices that “corruptly” refers to “consciousness of wrongdoing.” Gorsuch, at one point, tried to clarify that a defendant must know that what he is doing is “unlawful.” Sinzdak stressed again: “Or wrongful.”

That’s when Gorsuch asked about mortal or venial sins.

Multiple justices asked Sinzdak whether she could “live with” a ruling that would clarify the law to bar “unlawful” conduct — actions prohibited by state or local laws.

Sinzdak confirmed that she’d prefer the justices perform that narrower “surgery” of the law, rather than cutting out gratuity prosecutions entirely.