Dennis Hastert to serve 15 months in a federal prison hospital
Disgraced former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert will report to a federal medical prison in Rochester, Minnesota, by 2 p.m. Wednesday to serve a 15-month sentence, according to the Associated Press, which cited an email with Hastert's lawyer, Thomas Green.
The Rochester Federal Medical Center, where Hastert will turn 75 years old, is about 350 miles away from Chicago and has about 700 inmates. It is affiliated with the Mayo Clinic and focuses on providing medical services for male inmates of poor health and long-term medical conditions.
Hastert has been plagued with health problems since he pleaded guilty in October to illegally structuring $950,000 in bank withdrawals in a hush-money case. He suffered a stroke and shortly afterward was diagnosed with a rare blood infection.
The former speaker had been trying to hide his sexual abuse of up to five teenagers decades ago, when he coached a high school wrestling team in Yorkville, Illinois.
Judge Thomas Durkin, who called Hastert a "serial child molester" during the sentencing, recommended sending Hastert to the Rochester facility.
Other infamous prisoners sent to Rochester include former Rep. Dan Rostenkowski, D-Illinois, who was convicted of mail fraud, and Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, the blind Muslim cleric who was convicted of conspiracy in the first World Trade Center attack in 1993 that killed six people.
If Hastert completes his prison sentence, he will have to complete sex-offender treatment, comply with a supervised release from prison for two years and pay $250,000 in fines.
The case makes Hastert Illinois' highest-ranking U.S. politician ever to be incarcerated.