GTCR is Rauner’s Bain Capital. So Squeezy gives him a state contract. Shaking up Springfield?

The Better Government Association is reporting this morning:

Bruce Rauner, the Republican challenger for governor, stands to profit from a lucrative state contract awarded last year by the administration of his opponent on the November ballot, Gov. Pat Quinn, records show.

Rauner formerly headed GTCR LLC, a Chicago private equity firm in which he still holds a stake as an investor.

In an election for governor in any other state than Illinois GTCR would be Bruce Rauner’s Bain Capital.

Bain Capital was the albatross around Mitt Romney’s neck during his presidential run.  It was the metaphor for Romney’s attachment to the one percent – a venture capital firm that bought companies, stripped them of their assets, fired employees and then resold what was left.

GTCR LLC owns Correctional Healthcare.

Correctional Healthcare is a private for-profit company that treats 70,000 inmates a day at more than 250 correctional facilities around the United States.

It doesn’t treat them well.

In Illinois, the company has drawn criticism in connection with a federal lawsuit filed in 2012 by the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois against the state Department of Juvenile Justice, accusing the state agency of inadequately treating detainees with mental health conditions.

In May 2011 a lawsuit was filed in federal court in Chicago against Correctional Healthcare.

The lawsuit said that a Correctional Healthcare doctor refused to send a juvenile detainee to a hospital until more than 14 hours after the boy first complained of severe testicular pain.

As a result, one of the boy’s testicles had to be surgically removed, according to the suit.

Rauner’s firm has been in similar trouble before.

Juanita Jackson, Elvira Nunziata and Arlene Townsend all died after living in Florida nursing homes that, for a time, THI operated or provided support to, according to lawsuits filed by the families.

Fact: THI was co-founded in 1998 by GTCR, the Chicago investment company of which Bruce Rauner was chairman, and set out to become “one of the leading long-term care companies” in the country.

So, naturally Squeezy’s administration gave GTCR a $100 million contract to take care of the state’s incarcerated juveniles.

Springfield may need shaking up.

But it won’t be done by these two.