Former United States House Speaker Dennis Hastert died of natural causes at his home in Kendall County, Illinois, over the weekend. He was 84. The local coroner, Jacquie Purcell, confirmed the news to The Guardian.Dennis Hastert is survived by his wife of 53 years, Jean Hastert, and their two sons, Ethan and Joshua. Jean, whose maiden name is Kahl, is a retired physical education teacher from northern Illinois.In 2016, Dennis Hastert was sentenced to 15 months in prison for paying hush money to one of his former students to cover up s****l abuse. He pleaded guilty to evading bank laws and said he was “deeply ashamed” for his misconduct, without admitting the abuse.Jean Hastert wrote a letter of support for her husband during his legal trouble.“I have never known a more honorable and devoted man. He has spent his life in the service of others. He has always been selfless with his time and talents and has been incredibly devoted to the success of others,” she wrote at the time.All about Jean Hastert amid Dennis Hastert’s deathJean Hastert was a P.E. teacher in Yorkville, Illinois, for children in kindergarten through 3rd grade. In a 1999 interview with The Chicago Tribune, she said about becoming a congressman’s wife:“I just like being a gym teacher in Yorkville… When I get up in the morning, I am not thinking, ‘I am the first lady of the House of Representatives.’ I am thinking that I have to be at school at 8 o’clock and what am I going to do today with my 2nd graders?”Back then, Jean taught the 1st and 2nd graders at Yorkville Grade School in the morning shift and the 3rd graders at Yorkville Intermediate School in the afternoon. She had been an educator for 30+ years.In March 2016, Jean Hastert wrote a letter pleading with Judge Thomas Durkin to consider their family before sentencing her husband.“If one of his students or wrestlers ever needed anything of him, he would be there for them, and he was never happier than when he could watch someone he helped succeed,” Jean wrote.She mentioned that before Dennis suffered a stroke in November 2015, he helped others and found ways to “give back to his community,” and “given the time and if his health improved,” he’d continue with the same. Jean, who married Dennis in 1973, also wrote about his college volunteer work.“Denny's selflessness has not been without cost, however. Because he spent so much of his career away from home helping others, we always looked forward to his retirement so that we could spend more time together. Now, with his failing health, I worry about how much time we will ever get together. This has taken a terrible toll on our family. Please consider us when determining an appropriate sentence,” Jean concluded.Dennis and Jean Hastert first met when they were both educators at Yorkville High School in the 1970s. Later, they had a movie date to Aurora, which became a turning point in the relationship.In his memoir, Speaker: Lessons from Forty Years in Coaching and Politics, Dennis Hastert recalled telling fellow Republicans Whip Tom DeLay and Bill Paxon that his wife wouldn’t want him to run for Speaker. However, when the men called Jean, they found she was “supportive.” Jean later told her husband:“You’ve got to do what you think is right.”Before becoming a politician, including the longest-serving Republican House Speaker, Dennis Hastert had a 16-year-long high school coaching career and led his team in the small town of Yorkville, west of Chicago, to a state championship. Subsequently, he was also named national coach of the year in 1976.However, he allegedly s******y abused at least four teenage boys on his wrestling team between 1965 and 1981. Years later, in 2015, federal prosecutors investigated Dennis Hastert for financial crimes, and the abuse allegations came to the forefront.In court documents, one of his ex-students, identified as Individual A, accused Dennis Hastert of improper touching inside a motel room on their way home from wrestling camp. The accuser was 14 at the time. The politician paid over $1.7 million out of $3.5 million he promised to Individual A, including paying him lump-sum cash of $100,000 at a time after the alleged victim confronted him in 2010.In November 2015, Dennis Hastert entered a guilty plea to evading bank laws but was not charged with s****l crimes, despite other alleged victims testifying that he purportedly performed unconsensual s****l acts on them in locker rooms when they were minors. One of them was visibly emotional about this “dark secret” from his adolescence, according to The Guardian.Other accusations included Hastert sitting on a recliner outside the shower room and watching the boys and offering them massages. While Dennis admitted he “mistreated” some of the athletes, he didn’t confess to the abuse. Federal prosecutors later said that the statute of limitations had passed, which is why they couldn’t charge the former Speaker with s*x crimes.Meanwhile, his legal team released a statement that read:“Mr. Hastert is deeply sorry and apologizes for his misconduct that occurred decades ago and the resulting harm he caused to others. Mr. Hastert’s fall from grace has been swift and devastating.”It continued:“Neither we as his lawyers, nor Mr. Hastert, have the present insight to understand and reconcile the unfortunate and harmful incidents he caused decades ago with the enduring achievements, leadership, and generosity that earned him extraordinary affection and respect throughout this country during his many years of public service.”Dennis Hastert was the House Speaker from 1999 to 2007. He succeeded Newt Gingrich after the latter lost the Republican Party’s support because of ethics violations. Hastert presided over Bill Clinton’s Senate impeachment trial and the Bush administration’s various policies.