1 Mayor Sentenced, 1 Pleads Guilty in Illinois Town’s Insurance Procurement Case

On Aug. 13, the former mayor of a southwest Illinois town became the second area mayor to plead guilty to lying to federal agents investigating a case involving commission payments related to the placement of casualty loss and workers’ compensation insurance for an Illinois municipality.

An indictment filed July 22 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Illinois charged Tim Lowry, an insurance agent and the former mayor of Red Bud, Illinois, with falsely testifying in April 2019 to an FBI agent and an officer with the federal Southern Illinois Public Corruption Task Force that he did not pay Kevin Hutchinson, the former mayor of Columbia, Illinois, part of a commission Lowry received for facilitating an insurance contract with the city of Columbia for casualty loss and workers’ comp coverage.

Lowry, who owned the Ackermann Agency in Red Bud, directed payment through a third party to Hutchinson in the amount of $15,854 for placement of the insurance contract with the city of Columbia, court documents state.

The nearly $16,000 Lowry paid Hutchison represented around 40% of Lowry’s 2016 through 2018 commission on the account from the Illinois Counties Risk Management Trust (ICRMT), an organization that provides insurance and risk management services to public entities in Illinois, according to the published stipulation of facts in the case.

When questioned by the FBI and the task force official in 2019, however, Lowry said he did not make any payments and that Hutchinson did not receive any as a result of the insurance contract with ICRMT.

Lowry’s plea came roughly a month and a half after Hutchison, Columbia’s former mayor, was sentenced for lying to federal investigators about receiving payments from Lowry in relation to his city’s purchase of the ICRMT coverage.

Hutchinson, 56, was indicted in February and pleaded guilty in March to the charge of lying to federal investigators. He was sentenced on June 29 to two years’ probation, a $500 fine, and 40 hours of community service, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Illinois.

Hutchinson was also a licensed insurance agent and owned a closely held Illinois corporation called BMC Associates Inc. Neither the city council nor the city manager were aware of the payments by Lowry to Hutchinson and his company, federal authorities said. Hutchinson resigned his post as mayor of Columbia after being indicted.

The Associated Press reported that before he resigned Hutchinson had been serving in his fourth term as mayor of Columbia, a community of about 11,000 located on the Mississippi River about 13 miles south of St. Louis.

Under Illinois law, as elected public officials both Lowry and Hutchinson were prohibited from having any direct or indirect personal financial interest in contracts with the municipalities they governed.

Although Lowry could face up to five years in prison, prosecutors are recommending a sentence of one year probation, a $1,000 fine and 40 hours of community service. Lowry has resigned as mayor of Red Bud, a small community also near St. Louis.

Lowry’s sentencing is scheduled for Nov. 22.

Topics Illinois