Stroger Failed to Report $733,000 Political Donations

As Chicago-style excuses go, this may be a new one. Chicago Tribune:

Campaign finance reports filed with the state show Stroger failed to report $733,000 in political donations—about a quarter of what he's collected since October 2006. He also got far more help from his father than he had disclosed and has $520,000 in investments not previously listed.

Stroger has paid $27,000 in fines and his campaign has acknowledged its latest attempt to set the record straight could trigger more penalties from the Illinois State Board of Elections.

A consultant hired by the Stroger campaign funds to correct the filings said the slipshod reporting was a result of Stroger's father, John, becoming ill and later dying. "It wasn't that any money was ever missing," said Vincent Fry, a Maryland campaign consultant. "It's that the one guy who knew everything died."

Ah - so that's why they couldn't ask where those deposits came from, I guess. And I love this: "It wasn't that any money was ever missing." What was the question, again?

(H/T James Bregenzer, #icot.)