Naperville businessman charged with bribing 'city agent'
It was June, 2008, when a Naperville businessman met with an influential city alderman to talk about winning lucrative airport concessions contracts.
Their discussion was part in code and part out loud.
(John H. White/Sun-Times)
But it was all captured on FBI recordings, according to charges.
With both video and audio rolling, the businessman, Wafeek "Wally" Aiyash, allegedly offered Ald. Isaac "Ike" Carothers a $100,000 cash bribe -- $10,000 of it up front -- if Carothers would secure concessions contracts for him, a criminal complaint unsealed Thursday says.
At another meeting between the two, Carothers picked up an envelope stuffed with $5,000 in cash, held it in front of a video camera for several seconds and then put it in his jacket, according to charges. With the cash came a map from Aiyash with "requested locations" for seven different restaurants he and his partners wanted to open at O'Hare and Midway airports, the charges say.
Aiyash, 50, was arrested Thursday morning and charged with bribing Carothers, who himself was charged with bribe-taking last spring. The Sun-Times reported in the spring that Carothers was secretly cooperating
with authorities for a year, including wearing a wire. He's pleaded not guilty to federal charges. Aiyash's complaint is the first detailing of Carothers' cooperation with the FBI.
It involved a number of meetings and phone calls with Aiyash, the owner of a restaurant, sports bar and housing businesses, according to public records.
At one point after he allegedly passed Carothers a $5,000 bribe, the businessman left Carothers numerous messages to call him back, including one where Aiyash said he was with another alderman, referred to only as Alderman A, in the complaint.
Before the June, 2008, meeting, an FBI agent handed Carothers a marked business card. On it, Carothers wrote: "100 & Partner," referring to past discussions with Aiyash about teaming up at the airports.
At the meeting with Aiyash, Carothers wrote on the card: "10 to start" to ask for a $10,000 advance. He then asked Aiyash on tape: "Can we do something like that? To get started?"
Aiyash allegedly responded: "I think so yeah," and, in a response to whether it would be in cash, he's accused of saying: "That's the only way I'll do it."
After the meeting, Carothers handed the same card back to the FBI, according to charges.
Aiyash's lawyer had no comment on the charges.
The complaint does not name the cooperator, but sources told the Chicago Sun-Times it is Carothers.
Carothers (29th) is one of 14 members of the City Council's Aviation Committee. On Thursday, Rosemarie Andolino, who heads the Department of Aviation and O'Hare Airport expansion, was stunned by the allegations. She said procedures are in place that would keep from giving one person too much power.
"Decisions are made with my team of people. There's never any aldermanic decision in any of that," Andolino said.
She said the city hasn't added any concession contracts recently. "We have a couple of things that are up that were reviewed a long, long time ago that are now coming to fruition. [But], we have not put anything to bid recently at all."
Contributing: Tim Novak