An Illinois woman has come forward to claim that her late brother was sexually abused by Dennis Hastert for four years. This is not the as yet unnamed person who was receiving purported hush money from Hastert. From ABC News’s exclusive:

In Steve Reinboldt’s 1970 high school yearbook, wrestling coach Dennis Hastert wrote that Steve was his “great, right hand man” as the student equipment manager of the Yorkville, Illinois wrestling team.

But Steve was also a victim of sexual abuse at the hands of Hastert, Steve’s sister said today in an interview with ABC News. It is the first time an alleged Hastert victim has been identified by namesince his indictment for lying to the FBI and violating federal banking laws to cover-up past misconduct. Hastert, due in court next week, has not responded to the allegations.

In an emotional interview, Steve Reinboldt’s sister Jolene said she first learned of her late brother’s purported years-long sexual abuse at the hands of the future Speaker of the House back in 1979 when her brother revealed to her that he was gay and had been out of high school for eight years.

“I asked him, when was your first same sex experience. He looked at me and said, ‘It was with Dennis Hastert,’” Jolene said. “I was stunned.”

Jolene said she asked her brother why he never told anyone. “And he just turned around and kind of looked at me and said, ‘Who is ever going to believe me?’”

More:

Reinboldt’s sister says she has no doubts about the veracity of what her brother told her 36 years ago.

“[Steve] just told me the basics. I believed him 100 percent. But he never went into any details -– where it happened, or what the sexual experiences were like, anything like that,” Jolene said.

Jolene said she believes the abuse ended when Steve moved away after his high school graduation in 1971. Reinboldt died of AIDS in 1995. She believes Hastert’s alleged actions irrevocably changed Steve’s life for the worse.

“He took his belief in himself and his kind of right to be a normal person,” Jolene said. “Here was the mentor, the man who was, you know, basically his friend and stepped into that parental role, who was the one who was abusing him… He damaged Steve I think more than any of us will ever know.”

She says Hastert came to her brother’s funeral, and that she confronted him in the parking lot afterward:

“Then I just continued to say, ‘I want you to know your secret didn’t die in there with my brother. And I want you to remember that I’m out here and that I know.’ And again, he just stood there and he did not say a word.”

Hastert got in his car and drove away. Jolene said Hastert’s non-response “said everything.”

Read the whole thing. If there are other Hastert victims, Jolene appeals to them to come forward. I hope and pray that they find the courage to do so. If Hastert is guilty, he must not be allowed to get away with it. I’m sure the statute of limitations has run out, but if these allegations are true, then I hope Dennis Hastert will be held to account in civil court to the fullest possible extent. Let it all come out.

If Jolene’s story is true — and it has not been proven — then God only knows where and what poor Steve Reinboldt would be today if Hastert had not stolen his youth from him. In any case, Dennis Hastert has to answer her.

(“Best wishes in your senior year, Mr. Hastert” is how the former wrestling coach signed Steve Reinboldt’s yearbook. See the ABC story for a photograph of it.)