After 3 years under wraps, former Chicago alderman's unprecedented deal with the feds has gone public

CHICAGO — After more than three years under wraps, the unprecedented deferred prosecution agreement between ex-Ald. Daniel Solis and the U.S. attorney’s office went public Tuesday, a day before the former Zoning Committee chairman is scheduled to be arraigned.

Solis, who turned government mole to help federal investigators build cases against Ald. Edward Burke and former House Speaker Michael Madigan, was charged with a single bribery count on Friday.

The bare-bones, one-count criminal information alleged Solis, who abruptly announced his retirement as 25th Ward alderman in 2018 before his cooperation with the FBI was revealed, corruptly solicited campaign donations from an unidentified real estate developer in exchange for zoning changes in 2015, when Solis was head of the City Council Zoning Committee.

Burke’s attorneys revealed in a court filing in 2020 that Solis had cut a deal with the U.S. attorney’s office known as a deferred prosecution agreement that meant he likely would escape conviction for his alleged misconduct.

On Tuesday, a day before Solis is scheduled to be arraigned on the charge, prosecutors made it official, filing an eight-page agreement showing that they will dismiss the case against Solis in three years as long as he continues to cooperate in the ongoing investigations.

Solis’ deal “is based upon the substantial assistance Mr. Solis has provided to law enforcement to date, and … is expressly conditioned upon his continued cooperation,” prosecutors wrote in the document.

The document includes a statement of facts that Solis has admitted, including that he accepted at least $15,000 in campaign cash from the developer, identified only as Developer A, and asked representatives from the business to attend his annual fundraiser in September 2015.

Solis chaired the Zoning Committee meeting on Sept. 21, 2015, where Developer A’s zoning change was recommended. It was passed by the full City Council three days later, with Solis voting in favor of the project, the agreement stated.

A spokesman for U.S. Attorney John Lausch could not immediately be reached for comment Tuesday.

Solis’ attorney, Lisa Noller, could not immediately be reached.

Solis’ agreement was believed to be unprecedented for a public official allegedly caught betraying the public trust — but then again, so was his cooperation.

By secretly recording conversations with Burke and Madigan over the phone and in person, Solis was in uncharted waters even in a state with a long history of government cooperators, becoming a linchpin in a sprawling investigation that targeted two old-guard members of the Chicago Democratic machine.

The deferred prosecution agreement means Solis, 72, will not only escape any jail time, but also could keep collecting his nearly $100,000 annual city pension, which could easily bring in a sizable sum from the taxpayer-funded system over the remainder of his lifetime.

Last, year, the Chicago Tribune interviewed nearly a dozen longtime members of the city’s legal community, including several who worked on public corruption cases for the U.S. attorney’s office, and none could remember such an arrangement being made for a public official caught abusing their office.

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