Tony Rezko

Antoin Rezko (born 1955) is an American businessman and convict.

He was a fundraiser for Illinois Democratic and Republican politicians.

After becoming a major contributor to Rod Blagojevich's successful election for governor, Barack Obama's campaigns, Rezko assisted Blagojevich in setting up the state's first Democratic administration in twenty years and as a result he was able to have business associates appointed onto several state boards.

Tony Rezko was born in 1955 in Aleppo, Syria, to a prominent Assyrian Syriac Catholic family.

After graduating from college there, Rezko moved to Chicago and earned undergraduate and master's degrees in civil engineering from the Illinois Institute of Technology in the late 1970s.

He designed nuclear power plants at an engineering company, and then worked for the Illinois Department of Transportation designing highways, where he earned $21,590 in his first year.

While he was an engineer, Rezko started buying vacant lots and developing single family residences.

He also began investing in fast-food restaurants, including the first Subway in Chicago.

Many properties were in lower-income African American neighborhoods where he met Jabir Herbert (J.H.) Muhammad, former manager of heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali and son of the late Nation of Islam leader, Elijah Muhammad.

Rezko was asked in 1983 to support the successful mayoral candidacy of African-American Harold Washington.

J.H. Muhammad's company, Crucial Concessions, hired Rezko in 1984 and won a food contract on Lake Michigan beaches and in many Chicago South Side parks.

Rezko put together endorsement deals for Ali, became the executive director of the Muhammad Ali Foundation, and traveled the world with Ali for five years.

In January 1989, Rezko and attorney Daniel Mahru, CEO of a firm that leased ice makers to bars and hotels, founded a real-estate development and restaurant holding corporation called Rezmar Corporation.

Between 1989 and 1998, Rezmar rehabilitated 30 buildings, a total of 1,025 apartments, spending more than $100 million from the city, state and federal governments and bank loans.

Rezko and Mahru weren't responsible for any government or bank loans or the $50 million in federal tax credits they got to rehab the buildings.

Rezmar put just $100 into each project and got a 1% stake as the general partner in charge of hiring the architect, contractor, and the company that would manage the buildings.

They selected Chicago Property Management, also owned by Rezko and Mahru, to manage the buildings, including selecting the tenants and making repairs.

Rezmar also got upfront development fees of at least $6.9 million in all.

Under its deals with the Chicago Equity Fund, Rezmar promised to cover all operating losses in any building for seven years, but had no obligation after that, although the Federal Government could recover the tax credits that Rezmar sold from the holders if the projects did not survive for fifteen years or more.

In 1997, Crucial Concessions opened two Panda Express Restaurants at O'Hare, under the city's minority set-aside program.

By 1998 the company had a net worth of US$34 million and it then turned to purchasing old factories and parcels of land in gentrifying areas of Chicago and turning them into upscale condominium complexes.

Rezko was named "Entrepreneur of the Decade" by the Arab-American Business and Professional Association.

Rezko's investment in restaurant food chains had started with a chain of Panda Express Chinese restaurants.

In 1998, Rezko opened his first chain of Papa John's Pizza restaurants in Chicago and by 2002, he had twenty-six stores in Chicago, at least fifteen in Wisconsin, and seven in Detroit, part of the financing for these stores was through GE Capital.

By 2001, Rezko began to fall behind on his franchise payments and loans and he transferred the franchises to several business associates.

Rezko and Levine were charged with attempting to extort millions of dollars from businesses seeking to do business with the Illinois Teachers System Board and the Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board from 2002 to 2004.

Levine pleaded guilty and agreed to testify against Rezko and others.

While the charges carry a maximum sentence of life in prison, Levine expects to receive about a 5-1/2 year sentence in return for his testimony.

The case was prosecuted by Patrick Fitzgerald.

It lost those franchises in 2005, on the grounds that J.H. Muhammad was merely a front man for Rezko, who had been appointed trustee of Elijah Muhammad's affairs in the early 1990s.

As his business ventures began failing, Rezko entered into several partnership with Iraqi-born business executive Nadhmi Auchi, including a massive 2005 real estate development project on Chicago's South Loop whose value was pegged by an observer familiar with the deal at $130.5 million.

Rezko and several others were indicted on federal charges in October 2006 for using their connections on the state boards to demand kickbacks from businesses that wished to engage in dealings with the state.

While the others pleaded guilty, Rezko pleaded not guilty and was tried.

In 2006, during a lawsuit with Papa John's over his franchise fees, Rezko renamed his Papa John's restaurants to Papa Tony's. Rezko also had a lien filed against his home after losing a civil lawsuit to GE Capital.

In October 2006, Rezko was indicted along with businessman Stuart Levine on charges of wire fraud, bribery, money laundering, and attempted extortion as a result of a federal investigation known as "Operation Board Games."

Levine was once a top Republican fund-raiser who had switched loyalty.

In March 2008 Muhammad sued Rezko, alleging that he had been swindled out of his home and business interests.

In 2008, Rezko was imprisoned for his failure to disclose a $3.5m loan from Auchi.

Rezko was later convicted on 16 charges of corruption and fraud and was sentenced to serve 10 1⁄2 years in prison.

He was found guilty of 16 of the 24 charges filed against him and on November 23, 2011, he was sentenced to 10.5 years in prison.