Former Chicago-area highway commissioner gets 3.5 years for 6-figure wire fraud scheme

A former suburban Chicago highway commissioner was sentenced to three and a half years in prison Tuesday for taking more than $280,000 in kickbacks from an excavation company.

Robert Czernek, 71, the former elected head of the Bloomingdale Township highway commission, pleaded guilty last March to one count of honest-services wire fraud. He was charged in an August 2020 indictment along with Debra Fazio, the owner of Bloomingdale-based Bulldog Earth Movers Inc., and her employee, Mario Giannini.

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Czernek read from a written statement in court.

“I make no excuses for my conduct,” he said. “My crime was not a mistake, it was something that I did to enrich myself.”

U.S. District Judge Matthew Kennelly credited Czernek for taking a plea deal from prosecutors and testifying at Giannini’s 2021 trial.

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Giannini is appealing his May conviction on 14 counts of wire fraud. He was sentenced to five years in prison. Kennelly last March dismissed a wire fraud charge against Fazio, saying prosecutors had not proven she knew of the scheme or participated in it.

Czernek and Giannini will have to pay more than $500,000 restitution to the township.