WTD PRESENTS: HISTORY LESSON - THE DUFF FAMILY

photo via Chicago Clout

What's going on? Just a week ago, Daley's Commissioner of Human Resources Homero Tristan quit. And now, another one of the mayor's city hall weasels - Montel Gayles - has also quit. Daley's Chief Procurement Officer Abruptly Resigns:

Mayor Daley’s $169,020 chief procurement officer abruptly resigned Tuesday, spinning the revolving door in a department that has struggled to boost black contracting and weed out minority fronts.

...

Gayles embarrassed and infuriated Daley with kid-gloves treatment of James Duff, head of a mob-connected family that became the poster child for minority business fraud in Chicago.

Gayles banned Duff from doing business with the city for just three years, even though Duff pleaded guilty to fraudulently obtaining $100 million in janitorial contracts earmarked for minorities and women.

Awww, Mayor Daley and the Chicago Mob. Meant for Each Other.













Check out The Chicago Syndicate for more on Daley's connections to the Duff family:

[The Duffs are] pinkish tough guys, with Daley clout, from a family that brags about ties to the Outfit bosses, including the late Anthony Accardo, and the imprisoned (but still vigorous behind bars) Rocco Infelice.

"I know a lot of people," Daley told reporters. "And they have to be on their merits. And that's what it is."

He was asked: Is it disconcerting to you that your friends and political supporters were indicted? "It happens, unfortunately, it does," he said.

The mayor did brag, though, once the Duff scandal became public--he forgot to mention that Tribune investigative reporters and editors made it public--that his administration denied minority contract certification to 880 companies.

A Tribune reporter asked: How many of those denied were political contributors?

"Geez, I don't know."

How many were your friends?

"Gee, I don't know. I don't really know. Doesn't matter if they're friends or not."

Geez.

Daley made news, although some might miss it, by admitting Thursday that he knows the Duffs. When the Tribune first broke the Duff investigation in 1999, he didn't know them. "Oh, I know them. Sure," he said Thursday. "You know that. They're hard-working people. This is an unfortunate incident."

What about their ties to organized crime? "Geez. I don't know about that," said the crime-fighting mayor of Chicago.

GEEZ. Same old tired lines Daley is still using. This whole Mayor Daley defending criminals as "hardworking" and claiming to know nothing about the many scandals surrounding City Hall thing is getting REALLY old.