Ex-Gov on NBC's Celebrity Apprentice

After glad-handing citizens and hustling on the campaign trail, Rod Blagojevich, the man with the trademark Beatles-style do, convinced 1.7 million Illinois voters to re-elect him governor in 2006.

Nearly four years later, the now-impeached governor hopes to win over just 12 very important votes: the jurors who will decide his fate in his highly publicized public corruption trial that begins Thursday in Chicago. This time, however, he won’t be able to chat them up or shake their hands — as badly as he may want to.

“I’m sure he’ll find it very frustrating,” Kent Redfield, professor emeritus of political studies and public affairs at the University of Illinois-Springfield, told AOL News on the eve of the trial.

What Blagojevich is expected to do is take the stand on his own behalf. How that plays out is anyone’s guess.

“He has the supreme confidence in his ability to win people over and be persuasive,” said Redfield, adding, “It’s often not very well placed.”

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Related Story

Blagojevich Attorneys  Subpoena White House Aides Rahm Emanuel and Valerie Jarrett (Politics Daily)

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhtdBMOorDk

Amy Hess/fbi photo

WASHINGTON — Amy S. Hess is leaving FBI headquarters to take the post as special agent in charge of the Memphis office, the FBI announced Wednesday.

Hess most recently served as section chief in the International Operations Division.

She joined the FBI in 1991 and was first assigned to the Kansas City field office, where she worked violent crimes, gangs and drug trafficking.

In 1999, she headed to the Louisville Division where she worked domestic terrorism. She was promoted to supervisory special agent of the counterterrorism and counterintelligence squad in 2002.

Paul Clouston/america's most wanted photo

For the past four years, 73-year-old fugitive Paul Clouston toiled away in relative anonymity in Merced, Calif., despite being featured several times on a nationally televised crime show.

The convicted cop killer and child molester was captured just as quietly. He was reading a newspaper at the men’s group home where he worked as a maintenance man in this community of some 80,000 in the central part of the state.

Clouston served time for both crimes, but he became a fugitive after being charged with failing to register as a sex offender and violating parole. In 2006, authorities raised his public profile by placing him on the U.S. Marshals Service’s 15 Most Wanted Fugitive List.

He was featured three times on the show “America’s Most Wanted” from 2006 to 2009. The program also continued to post his photo on its website for all to see.

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By Allan Lengel

Mexican authorities are condemning the death of a 32-year-old Mexican man who died days after a U.S. Border Patrol agent shocked him with a stun gun at a California border crossing, the Associated Press is reporting.

AP reported that Anastasio Hernandez died Monday at a hospital in Chula Vista, south of San Diego, days after he was shocked at San Isidro, Calif.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokeswoman Jacqueline Dizdul have alleged that a Border Patrol agent used a stun gun on Hernandez after he refused to stop fighting with agents who were trying on Friday to hand him over to Mexican officials in Tijuana because he had entered the U.S. illegally.

An investigation is underway.

By Allan Lengel

The fallout from the Times Square car bomb case on May 1 could lead to deportations.

A federal immigration judge in Boston has scheduled an Aug. 10 deportation hearing for Pakistani Pir Khan, 43, of Watertown, Mass., one of three men arrested after FBI agents acted on information provided by the confessed Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad, the Associated Press reported.

At the time of the arrest, authorities said Khan and others may have provided money to Shahzad, but may not have known about any bomb plot.  None have been charged in connection with the case.

U.S. Immigration Judge Matthew on Tuesday  found Khan was eligible for deportation because he illegally entered the U.S. via Mexico in 1991, AP reported. His attorney has said he has no ties to Shahzad, AP reported.

By New Orleans Times-Picayune

NEW ORLEANS — The Justice Department’s investigation into possible criminal and civil violations related to BP’s oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is an important and necessary step.

The more Americans learn about the decisions and missteps that may have contributed to the disaster, the more it seems that a wide range of infractions took place.

Visiting New Orleans Tuesday, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said the criminal probe into the matter has been under way for several weeks. He said FBI agents and personnel from civil branches of the Justice Department have been in Louisiana since shortly after the well’s explosion, collecting documents and other evidence.

Mr. Holder promised a “meticulous, comprehensive and aggressive” inquiry. “We won’t rest until we’re done,” he said.

Residents of the Gulf Coast are owed that much.

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• Iowa City Police Say Drunken Driver Was Naked (AP)
• Ex-CSI Chief Gets Jail Time for Evidence Tampering (AP)
• Wisc. Inmate Pleads Guilty to Assisting in Suicide (AP)
• Several Dropped From Slain Detroit Stripper’s Suit (AP)