FBI Dives into ‘Supermayor’ Tiffany Henyard’s Vegas Trip, Unveils Detailed Expense Subpoenas

Posted on: April 22, 2024, 08:31h. 

Last updated on: April 22, 2024, 01:25h.

Devin O'Connor @CasinoorgDevinO Read More
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Dolton Mayor and Thornton Township Tiffany Henyard, the self-proclaimed “supermayor” who took a lavish trip to a Las Vegas Strip casino last May, was served subpoenas on Friday afternoon by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

Tiffany Henyard subpoena Dolton Illinois
Dolton Mayor Tiffany Henyard has allegedly spent $8,000 on hair and makeup, expenses paid for with taxpayer money. That’s only the beginning of her alleged rampant financial corruption leading the small town in Illinois. (Image: Daily Mail)

Henyard is accused of vast corruption, spending more than $1 million of taxpayer money on various trips for her and her closest staff and a security detail more fitting for a United States president than a mayor whose town has a population of only 20,000 people. Last Friday, the FBI raided the Dolton Village Hall and served two subpoenas.

The first subpoena granted federal investigators access to Dolton’s finances and employee records. The subpoena was issued after Henyard vetoed an attempt by the Dolton Village Board to open an investigation into the mayor’s alleged misuse of funds.

Dolton subsequently hired former Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot as a special investigator. She’s being paid $400 an hour as she conducts her probe of Henyard’s spending.

The second subpoena dealt with Henyard’s top aide, Keith Freeman, the village administrator accused of conspiring with the mayor to use taxpayer money for their personal use. Freeman has been indicted on bankruptcy fraud after prosecutors allege he lied to creditors and his employment status with the town.

Sin City Jaunt Detailed

Several Dolton Village board members and local government officials have joined much of the public in calling for Henyard’s resignation. That includes attorney Burt Odelson, who is the Village of Dolton’s legislative counsel.

The ‘house of cards’ are collapsing,” Odelson told Fox 32.

Dolton trustee Tammie Brown agreed.

For months and months, we have been begging for someone to come out here and investigate as to what’s going on,” Brown said.

What’s been going on, federal officials disclosed in the subpoena, is that Henyard took trips to Las Vegas, Austin, Portland, New York City, Atlanta, and Washington, D.C., on taxpayer money for purported reasons that don’t carry much weight. She exclusively flew first class for those trips and stayed at posh hotels like the Four Seasons in Atlanta and Fairmont in Austin.

In Las Vegas, she and her crew stayed at Planet Hollywood on the Strip. The mayor and her entourage ran up $8,500 in charges there, plus a $587 meal at Ruth’s Chris Steak House. Henyard’s first-class airfare to Las Vegas cost $3,741.

Henyard’s trip to Sin City could end up costing taxpayers much more after a town employee on the trip accused a Dolton trustee of sexual assault. Federal law enforcement says a woman, who Henyard has since terminated, told the mayor she was assaulted sexually by Trustee Andrew Holmes after smoking cannabis and drinking alcohol.

Holmes allegedly Facetimed a Dolton police officer who was also on the trip to show the woman partially naked. The woman says she retained an article of clothing to prove the attack through forensic evidence.

Trip Explanation Without Weight

Henyard told Dolton board members that her trip to Las Vegas, which included two administrative assistants, two Dolton police officers, a photographer, a Dolton trustee, and two township trustees, was for the group to attend the International Council of Shopping Centers exhibition. The trade show was held at the Las Vegas Convention Center and brings stakeholders in commercial real estate together.

WGN Investigates reached out to other mayors in the Thornton area to see if attending such a conference on taxpayer money is common. It isn’t, mayors explained.

There certainly has been no discussion, or any evidence, past or present, of any direct benefit from this trip or any other trip to the taxpayers of South Holland,” said South Holland Mayor Don DeGraff, whose town is within Thornton Township. “The township has not, at any time in my 30 years of serving South Holland as mayor, played a role in either attracting or incentivizing any new business to our community.”

Homewood Mayor Rich Hofeld gave a more scathing review.

“She’s an embarrassment to local government,” Hofeld concluded.