Antoin “Tony” Rezko, the convicted fraudster and influence peddler, has won a reprieve -- for now. The judge who will decide how long Rezko will spend in jail suspended his deliberations Thursday pending Rezko’s decision to start spilling the beans about indicted Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich. If Rezko turns up the smoking gun and agrees to testify, he hopes to spend less time behind bars. Any evidence Rezko provides against Blagojevich may also cast light on his relationship with the other Chicago politician he lavishly funded: President elect Obama. On the day Rezko was indicted, Obama showed him around the Chicago home he was preparing to buy. Shortly afterwards, Mrs. Rezko boosted the value of the Obama property by buying the next door vacant lot and selling back a strip of land to the Obamas, meaning the neighboring plot was too small to build on.
Read it at The Wall Street Journal
