Dennis Hastert Pleads Not Guilty in Federal Case Targeting Bank Withdrawals

CHICAGO — After days of silence, J. Dennis Hastert, a former speaker of the House of Representatives, on Tuesday pleaded not guilty to federal charges that he illegally structured bank withdrawals and lied to the authorities about millions of dollars he had promised to pay someone for misconduct that occurred decades ago.

In a dark pinstripe suit and with his familiar helmet of gray hair, Mr. Hastert, 73, stood slightly stooped before the judge, flanked by lawyers, quietly answering the judge’s questions with a simple “yes” or “yes, sir.” It was the first time the once-powerful former congressman had appeared in public since the charges were announced last month, and he was met with a chaotic crush of news media in the federal courthouse here.

Aside from entering a not guilty plea, Mr. Hastert and his lawyers offered no further sense of their response to the charges, which are narrowly focused around financial transactions but which have raised a cloud of allegations of sexual misconduct for a man who had receded from public life.

The provisions of his release were routine yet stark for a man whose career arc had carried him from revered, small-town wrestling coach to the Illinois Statehouse and on to one of the top leadership posts in Congress. In addition to posting a $4,500 bond, Mr. Hastert was ordered to surrender his passport, remain in the continental United States, advise the court of any change in his address, and remove guns from his home within two weeks.

He was also ordered to avoid contact with anyone who might be a witness or an accuser in his case.

Mr. Hastert waived reading of the charges, and the hearing lasted less than 20 minutes. One of his lawyers, Thomas C. Green, who is from Washington and has broad experience representing public officials facing criminal investigations, formally offered the not guilty plea.

Mr. Hastert was indicted in late May on charges of structuring cash withdrawals and lying to federal investigators in connection to what prosecutors described as an arrangement to pay a person, identified only as Individual A, a total of $3.5 million in exchange for not revealing Mr. Hastert’s misconduct against that individual.

Two people briefed on the evidence uncovered in an F.B.I. investigation have said that Mr. Hastert, who once taught and coached wrestling at a high school in suburban Yorkville, Ill., was paying a former student not to say publicly that Mr. Hastert had sexually abused him decades ago. According to the indictment, Mr. Hastert, who had a lucrative career as a Washington lobbyist after leaving Congress in 2007, withdrew $1.7 million over the last four years to pay the individual.

The indictment does not include charges of sexual abuse. Legal experts said the statute of limitations had almost certainly run out on any such claims. Mr. Hastert worked as a teacher and coach in Yorkville, about 50 miles southwest of Chicago, from 1965 to 1981.

Instead, Mr. Hastert is accused of structuring his cash withdrawals in amounts less than $10,000 in order to avoid requirements that banks report larger sums. Generally, such structuring charges are part of drug or money-laundering cases and accompany other charges, like tax violations or embezzlement, rather than stand-alone accusations. While structuring cases can be complicated to prosecute, former prosecutors said this one appeared to be relatively straightforward.

According to the indictment against Mr. Hastert, he began withdrawing sums of $50,000 in cash from several bank accounts in June 2010 and providing them to Individual A every six weeks, for a total of 15 such exchanges. In April 2012, though, bank officials — who were required to file transaction reports on withdrawals of more than $10,000 — questioned Mr. Hastert about the amounts he had taken out. A few months later, he began making smaller withdrawals, of less than $10,000, and gave those to Individual A, the indictment says. He made 106 such smaller withdrawals, totaling $952,000, according to the indictment.

“The most challenging thing about structuring is usually proving that the defendant knew about the regulations, because they often assert a defense of, ‘I had no idea,’ ” said Randall D. Eliason, a former assistant United States attorney for the District of Columbia who specialized in prosecuting white-collar crime. But in this case, the prosecution’s evidence seems “pretty compelling,” he said.

Charles Stillman, a criminal defense lawyer and former federal prosecutor in New York, said that if Mr. Hastert had paid the money to Individual A without attempting to hide the withdrawals, he would not have been committing a crime.

“You’d think somebody would figure out that the banks are watching all of this,” he said. “One of the things that has fascinated me about this work I’ve been doing my whole life now is that some people just don’t get it. They engage in that sort of financial behavior without realizing there’s a consequence.”

On Dec. 8, Mr. Hastert was interviewed by federal agents, the indictment says. He said he felt unsafe in the nation’s banking system and was storing the money elsewhere for that reason, not paying someone with it. “I kept the cash,” he said, according to the indictment.

For those remarks, Mr. Hastert was charged with lying to federal agents.

Each of the two charges against Mr. Hastert carries a penalty of as much as five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Prosecutors have not said whether Individual A could face extortion charges, or perhaps charges of tax violations.

Some legal experts said they found the lack of charges against Individual A highly unusual, while others said the prospect of charges seemed unlikely, given that the person has apparently cooperated with the authorities and was described in the indictment as a victim of “misconduct” by Mr. Hastert.

By some legal interpretations, the agreement with Mr. Hastert could be seen as closer to a contract than extortion.

During Tuesday’s hearing, the judge, Thomas M. Durkin of the Federal District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, acknowledged what some people have viewed as potential conflicts: He donated $1,500 to Mr. Hastert’s campaigns in the early 2000s; had worked alongside Mr. Hastert’s son Ethan; and is the brother of Jim Durkin, the Republican leader of the Illinois House.

Judge Durkin, who was randomly assigned to hear Mr. Hastert’s case, said he would remove himself unless both sides decided later this week to waive any objections to him.

When the brief appearance was over, Mr. Hastert walked past a clutch of microphones and cameras in the lobby of the courthouse, shuffled through a revolving door and climbed into a black car.