A cousin of former Harvey Mayor Eric Kellogg has pleaded guilty to collecting bribes during a federal investigation into long-running political corruption in the south suburb.
According to a federal complaint filed in 2019, Kellogg spent years shaking down a strip club owner out of thousands of dollars a month in exchange for allowing prostitution at the club. He was not charged in the complaint, which called him only “Individual A” and “Mayor of the City of Harvey.”
But his cousin, Corey Johnson, was accused of collecting bribes from the now-shuttered club, Arnie’s Idle Hour, and giving the money to Kellogg’s brother, Rommell Kellogg, who was also charged in the bribery case.
The related federal complaint implicates Harvey Mayor Eric Kellogg in the persecution of a strip club
On Monday, Johnson pleaded guilty to theft of government funds, referring to the $35,000 the FBI secretly provided to the club’s manager to pay bribes to Johnson on a dozen occasions between October 2017 and April 2018.
Corey Johnson (far right) at the Dirksen Federal Building following his arrest in 2019.
Sun-Times files
According to prosecutors, Johnson accepted another $500,000 in bribes from the club between 2003 and October 2017. Because Johnson has accepted responsibility for his role as a bagman in the alleged bribery scheme, prosecutors say they will recommend him a sentence of less than six months. in prison.
FBI’s covert political support for former Harvey Mayor Eric Kellogg could be an issue in brother’s upcoming corruption trial
Rommell Kellogg faces trial scheduled for December 4. Prosecutors asked the court to prevent him from presenting evidence at trial related to the government’s investigative strategy and charging decisions involving his brother Eric, mayor of the financially troubled city from 2003 to 2019.
In 2020, Eric Kellogg’s brother, Derrick Muhammad, was sentenced to nine months in prison for using his position as a Harvey police officer to cover up a felon’s possession of a stolen Uzi submachine gun found in a towed vehicle.
Muhammad faces trial May 13 on separate federal charges that he used his badge to steer vehicle towing jobs in Harvey to private companies in exchange for kickbacks from 2011 to 2019.
Harvey’s strip club, now closed.
Scott Stewart / Sun Times
