Judge sentences McCann to 3.5 years in prison for campaign violations

[July 11, 2024]  By Brett Rowland | The Center Square

(The Center Square) – Former Illinois state Sen. William Samuel McCann Jr. is heading to federal prison.

A judge sentenced McCann, 54, to 42 months, or about 3.5 years, in prison on Tuesday. The judge also ordered the one-time candidate for governor to pay $683,816.61 in restitution for fraudulent use of campaign funds, money laundering and tax evasion.

McCann pleaded guilty to nine felonies in the middle of a bench trial in February in front of U.S. District Judge Colleen Lawless.

She said McCann betrayed the public trust and continued his fraud even after being questioned by a campaign employee and confronted by federal law enforcement officers. Lawless found it aggravating that McCann tried to avoid trial by falsely claiming that he was physically and mentally incapable of going to trial.

McCann, of Plainview, Illinois, served as a state senator for the 49th District of Illinois from 2011 to 2013, and for the redrawn 50th District from 2013 to January 2019.

McCann formed the Conservative Party of Illinois and, in 2018, launched an unsuccessful bid for Illinois governor.

McCann previously lived in Carlinville, Illinois, and owned and operated two construction-related businesses.

McCann organized multiple political committees that were registered with the Illinois State Board of Elections: Sam McCann for Senate; Sam McCann for Senate Committee; McCann for Illinois; and Conservative Party of Illinois. From April 2011 to November 2018, McCann and his political committees received more than $5 million in campaign donations.

Prosecutors said McCann used those donations for personal expenses in violation of federal law. They brought forward a raft of examples at trial and during sentencing:

McCann used more than $60,000 in campaign funds to partially fund the purchases of a 2017 Ford Expedition in April 2017 and a 2018 Ford F-250 truck in July 2018, which he titled in his own name and used for his personal travel. McCann then used campaign funds for loan payments on the F-250 and for fuel and insurance expenses for both vehicles, while at the same time using campaign funds to reimburse mileage expense claims which he did not incur.

In April 2018, McCann used $18,000 in campaign funds to buy a 2018 recreational travel trailer, and in May 2018, he used $25,000 in campaign funds to buy a 2006 recreational motor home, both of which McCann titled in his name.

McCann established an online account with a recreational vehicle rental business in Ohio and listed the vehicles for rent identifying Sam McCann as the owner. McCann then established a second account with the same rental business and identified himself as William McCann, a potential renter, with a different residential address and email than those he listed as the owner. From approximately May 2018 to June 2018, McCann, while representing himself as the renter, William, rented both the travel trailer and motor home from Sam, the owner, through the RV rental business. McCann caused a total of about $62,666 in campaign funds to be used to pay the rental cost of the vehicles. The rental business retained approximately $9,838 for commission and paid McCann, as the owner, approximately $52,827 by direct deposit to McCann's personal checking account. McCann reimbursed the campaign accounts $18,000, resulting in more than $77,000 in campaign funds used to buy and rent from himself.

Former Illinois Senator Sam McCann, R-Plainview.

On or about Oct. 4, 2016, McCann used a $20,000 cashier's check funded by a campaign account and issued to him to pay off a personal loan, including legal fees, that had originally been issued to him as an equipment loan in 2011 and was in collection by the bank due to non-payment.

From May 2015 to August 2020, McCann used campaign funds to pay about $64,750 on two separate personal mortgage loans that were secured by his former residence in Carlinville and an adjoining property used as an office for his construction business.

In November 2018, after an unsuccessful campaign for governor of Illinois, when he was no longer a candidate for office and did not financially support any other candidate, and continuing to June 2020, McCann caused the Conservative Party of Illinois to issue approximately $187,000 in payments to himself personally and an additional $52,282 in payments for payroll taxes. Using a payroll service, McCann was able to conceal himself as the payee for the expenditures from the campaign account.

McCann also converted more than $100,000 in campaign funds for payment of personal expenses including Green Dot credit card payments related to a family vacation in Colorado and other personal expenses; charges from Apple iTunes, Amazon, a skeet and trap club, Cabela's, Scheels, Best Buy, and a gun store; and cash withdrawals.

In relation to his joint return for calendar year 2018, McCann failed to report income from his 2018 rental payments to himself for the RV trailer and motor home. In addition, in March 2018, McCann used a $10,000 check issued by a campaign account to make a down payment to a Shipman, Illinois, business for a motor home. When the purchase was not completed, the business issued a $10,000 refund check payable to William McCann, which he deposited to his personal checking account and failed to report as income received.

On the third day of his bench trial, McCann pleaded guilty to all nine counts of the indictment, which charged him with seven counts of wire fraud, one count of money laundering and one count of tax evasion related to his alleged misuse of campaign money for personal expenses.

"As Judge Lawless explained in imposing sentence, McCann brazenly betrayed the public trust by engaging in a five-year scheme to defraud and converting more than $600,000 in campaign funds to his personal use," U.S. Attorney Gregory Harris said in a statement. "Today's sentence appropriately holds McCann accountable for his criminal conduct."