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NEW: Lawyers for indicted Ald. Ed Burke ask judge to suppress the feds' electronic surveillance that led to his racketeering indictment. From the intro:
Some background into the investigation of a Chicago alderman, whose name is redacted here but has been revealed to be former Ald. Danny Solis.
Burke's lawyers say it is "less clear" when the feds began investigating him, but that investigation appeared to intersect with the Solis investigation at the 2016 Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.
NEW: Federal prosecutors sought approval to wiretap six phone lines at the Chicago City Council Finance Committee office on May 1, 2017. The feds began intercepting calls from Chicago City Hall May 2, 2017.
The wiretap was quickly expanded. Burke's lawyers say the feds intercepted 2,185 calls from City Hall phones before abandoning the wiretap on May 31, 2017.
Ald. Burke's lawyers say the feds tapped Burke's cell phone from 5/15/17 until 2/10/18, what they call "the longest wiretap in the United States that concluded in 2018." In all, the feds recorded 9,101 calls from City Hall and the cell phone, they say.
Ald. Burke's lawyers want a hearing, claiming crucial information was withheld from Chicago's chief federal judge when the feds applied for the wiretaps.
One player allegedly described interactions with Solis as "15 months of harassment" and that "98 percent" of the pressure to hire Burke was from Solis "— or put another way, from the Government itself."
More on how Burke's lawyers say prosecutors won't explain how the Burke investigation began. "The Government's investigation seems to spring out of thin air."
