He was one of the most powerful figures in local Democratic politics, pulling strings behind the scenes and pumping a serious chunk of money into candidates and causes.
He served a seven-year prison sentence in a South Dakota federal prison camp, where he was assigned to a 17-cents-an-hour job filing prison maintenance work orders.
The saga of Amiel Cueto, a millionaire attorney from Belleville who was convicted in 1997 of obstructing the investigation and prosecution of his former business partner and client, video-gambling racketeer Tom Venezia, made headlines for much of the 1990s.
Cueto was tried along with former Washington Park police chief Robert Romanik, who pleaded guilty to obstructing justice in Venezia's racketeering trial. Venezia ran an illegal video poker machine ring in local taverns, a racket for which he is serving an eight-year sentence.
Cueto's trial was far-reaching, touching local politicians, attorneys, judges, and Belleville's Democratic Congressman Jerry Costello, Cueto's boyhood friend and one-time business partner. In the end, Cueto exhausted his appeals and lost his Missouri law license. Cueto's Illinois license was suspended in 1998.
And he was colorful, often lashing out at Miriam Miquelon, the assistant U.S. Attorney who prosecuted him. Cueto once referred to her as "Miss Piggy" in his now defunct tabloid newspaper, East Side Review.
Cueto's camp always argued the point Cueto's attorney Ronald Jenkins told the jury during the trial: Cueto's diligent defense of Venezia wasn't a crime.
"You've heard bully, you've heard arrogant, you've heard caustic, you've heard provocative," Jenkins said. "Those are character traits, ladies and gentlemen. They're not federal crimes."
