Dennis Hastert
Dennis Hastert was the Republican representative from Illinois’s 14th Congressional district from 1987 to 2007, as well as the Republican Speaker of the House from 1999 to 2007.
Before his election to the House, Dennis Hastert was employed at Yorkville High School as a teacher and a wrestling coach from 1965 to 1981. During that time, he sexually abused at least four of his students according to federal prosecutors
In 2012, the FBI and the IRS began investigating Hastert as a result of suspicious cash withdrawals from the taxpayer-funded Office of the Speaker. In 2015, he was indicted for improperly withdrawing  $952,000 in cash as part of an agreement to make payments totaling $3.5 million to an unnamed individual as to “compensate for and conceal his prior misconduct.”
Further investigation revealed that the unnamed individual had been a student at Yorkville High School while Hastert coached there. Interviews with other students and their families revealed multiple cases where Dennis Hastert sexually molested athletes on the wrestling team.
One former wrestler, Scott Cross, said that after a practice in 1979 Hastert began massaging him before grabbing his penis and stroking it. Cross fled the locker room and did not tell anybody until the other allegations became public.
In October of 2015, Hastert’s lawyers reached a plea agreement with the government. He pled guilty to a charge of felony structuring to avoid reporting requirements, paid a $250,000 fine and was sentenced to 15 months in prison and two years of supervised release.
Multiple other men came forward after his plea to accuse Hastert of sexually abusing them as children, but their cases did not move forward due to the statute of limitations having expired.
In 2021, Hastert reached an out-of-court settlement with the unnamed individual that he had promised $3.5 million for in exchange for not revealing his abuse.
At his sentencing, Dennis Hastert confessed to molesting at least three children as young as 14. The total number of his victims is unknown.
Conservative pedophile Dennis Hastert continues to receive his $73,000 yearly Congressional pension.
Sources:
A man two heartbeats away from the Presidency was a serial child molester, Vox
Ex-House speaker settles child sexual abuse payments suit, AP
Hastert victim finally confronts man who had been ‘a key figure in my life’, Chicago Tribune
