Teele, Toil, and Trouble

Teele is also enduring an investigation by the Internal Revenue Service, which has been scrutinizing his finances for the past two years and has been sorting through the bankruptcy of Applied Electrical Technologies Corporation. According to sources familiar with the probe, agents are also examining allegations that Teele may have failed to report income from business dealings in Italy and in Haiti.

Teele was well aware of the IRS investigation, which explains why his current attorney is David Garvin, who is best-known as a criminal tax attorney. Garvin has been representing Teele on IRS matters for the past eighteen months. Teele learned of the investigation into the $90,000 loan only two weeks ago, when his attorney received a letter from the U.S. Attorney's Office notifying him that the commissioner had become a target in the seaport investigation.

Within 48 hours the rumors were circulating, and political insiders had begun talking about Teele in the past tense.