BELLEVILLE – St. Clair County jurors convicted former East St. Louis Township consultant June Hamilton Dean of forgery and official misconduct on Oct. 22.
Dean presented no witnesses at trial, and jurors reached a decision in 46 minutes. They found she made a document falsely stating a person’s employment status and did it in violation of her duties as a government contractor.
Circuit Judge John O’Gara set sentencing Dec. 17.
Dean’s brother Oliver Hamilton, a former township treasurer, currently serves a sentence of five years for spending township money on himself.
His mother Mary Studivant Hamilton pleaded for his early release in June, “to allow him to spend a little quality time with his father before he passes.”
Prosecutors charged Oliver Hamilton and June Hamilton Dean 45 days apart.
U.S. prosecutors filed criminal information against Oliver in November 2016, claiming he defrauded the township out of $40,001.
According to Seventh Circuit appellate judges who reviewed his sentence, the U.S. passed up a chance to show losses in the hundreds of thousands.
Oliver retained Clyde Kuehn of Belleville and pleaded guilty on Dec. 2, 2016, after negotiating a plea agreement with a sentence of a year and a day – a deal later rejected by a federal court.
He agreed to pay $40,001 in restitution.
On Dec. 30, 2016, St. Clair County grand jurors indicted June Hamilton Dean.
She retained Justin Kuehn, Clyde Kuehn’s son.
Unlike Oliver, she pleaded not guilty.
Oliver’s plea agreement didn’t work out as he expected, because former U.S. district judge Michael Reagan rejected a sentence of a year and a day.
Prosecutors returned with an agreement for two years, advising Reagan that Oliver accepted responsibility.
Reagan disagreed, and quoted a text message Oliver sent to supporters.
It stated, “I am sure the judge is going to use all the lies the newspaper has printed to give me a maximum sentence…I guess I have to pay for going against the Belleville political party.”
Reagan imposed five years, finding Oliver “treated the financially unstable township as his piggy bank, and felt entitled to do so.”
Oliver appealed, and Seventh Circuit judges affirmed the sentence.
They found he earned $140,000 a year from his position as township supervisor and other sources.
They found that in his text messages, he pretended to be a friend of citizens while he stole from public aid programs.
Meanwhile, in June Hamilton Dean’s case at the county court, former circuit judge Jan Fiss continued the proceedings 12 times.
Chief Judge Andrew Gleeson assigned the case to Circuit Judge Zina Cruse in April 2018, and Justin Kuehn moved for substitution.
“The defendant has reason to believe that Judge Cruse is so prejudiced against her that she cannot receive a fair trial,” Justin Kuehn wrote.
Cruse granted the motion, and Gleeson assigned Circuit Judge Stephen McGlynn.
This year, after Gleeson transferred McGlynn from criminal court to civil court, Circuit Judge John O’Gara took the case.
He set trial to start Sept. 23.
On Sept. 11, Kuehn moved to withdraw as Dean’s counsel. He wrote that he received supplemental discovery on Sept. 10.
“Based on that discovery, the attorneys at Kuehn, Beasley and Young have a conflict of interest that precludes their continued representation of the defendant, June Dean,” he wrote.
O’Gara granted withdrawal and delayed trial for four weeks.
Dean retained Lloyd M. Cueto of Belleville.
On Oct. 21, the first day of trial, jury selection lasted about three hours and opening statements lasted 24 minutes.
State police agent Charles Willenborg testified for about an hour.
On Oct. 22, witnesses Alexa Edwards, Christopher Mendola, Edith Moore, and Yvette Johnson testified for the state.
Assistant state’s attorneys Daniel Lewis and John Trippi rested their case, and O’Gara excused jurors.
Cueto moved for a directed verdict, and argument followed for 21 minutes.
O’Gara denied the motion and brought jurors back.
They sat for only three minutes, because O’Gara declared a lunch break after Cueto rested Dean’s case without presenting evidence.
Jurors heard closing arguments and instructions after lunch, retired to deliberate at 1:12 p.m., and announced a verdict at 1:58 p.m.
O’Gara ordered the probation department to prepare an investigation report for Dean’s sentencing.
Oliver Hamilton resides at the U.S. prison camp near Marion, with nearly two years remaining on his sentence.
His mother, Mary Studivant Hamilton of Swansea, pleaded for an early release in a letter she sent to the district court clerk in June.
She wrote that her husband Sherman Hamilton was 88 years old and a 100 percent disabled American veteran. She wrote that he had stage four prostate cancer, blood clots in lungs and legs, and congestive heart failure.
She wrote that doctors said they have done all that can be done for him.
Reagan had retired, so the clerk assigned the case to District Judge Staci Yandle.
As of Oct. 28, she hadn’t acted on the letter.