Federal Government Wants To Seize Jesse Jackson Jr.'s Homes

By Amy Cavanaugh in News on Jun 29, 2013 7:00PM

Photo credit: Brendan Hoffman/Getty Images

On Friday, federal prosecutors asked a judge to let the government seize former Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. and his wife Sandi's homes in Washington, D.C. and Chicago, along with an IRA worth almost $80,000. The Chicago home is on East 72nd Street while the D.C. home is in Dupont Circle. In 2008, during the crime spree, the Jacksons transferred the properties to the Jesse Louis Jackson Jr. Living Trust, of which they are both trustees.

According to the Tribune:

Bill Miller, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office for the District of Columbia, on Friday called the prosecution motion a “standard filing in cases in which a defendant has a significant money judgment and equity in property that could be used to satisfy the money judgment.”

“The government is not trying to take over the properties from Jesse L. Jackson Jr. but is acting to protect its interest in securing the money judgment that the defendant has been ordered to pay,” Miller said.

Additionally, the prosecutors said that Jackson Jr., who had agreed to forfeit 24 items purchased with campaign funds as part of his plea agreement, had only turned over 12 items so far.

Jackson is going to be sentenced this coming Wednesday for taking $750,000 from the campaign treasury. Sandi will be sentenced for failing to report $600,000 in income to the IRS. Earlier this month, Jackson said that if both are sentenced to prison time, he wants to go to jail first.