Carol Stream printing company executive was convicted Friday of hiring a team of tough guys to travel the country and use threats and intimidation to collect debts on his behalf.
Mark Dziuban, 54, showed no reaction as the jury's verdict was announced that he was guilty on three of four counts of extortion. After Dziuban's lawyers warned against any outbursts, his family cried quietly in U.S. District Judge Edmond Chang's courtroom gallery as the jury filed out.
cComments Pay your bills or get introduced to the consequences. DJSYN0 AT 10:35 AM FEBRUARY 14, 2015 ADD A COMMENTSEE ALL COMMENTS 9
Dziuban, who remains free on bond, faces up to 20 years in prison, but with no criminal background he's likely to receive a much lighter sentence.
Prosecutors said Dziuban, who at the time was the vice president of sales at American Litho in Carol Stream, plotted with his friend, Frank Orlando, 48, to get back money he believed was owed on loans to several other businessmen in Chicago and elsewhere.
Prosecutors said Orlando and and Robert McManus, 44, enlisted the help of pizzeria owner Paul Carparelli, who in turn hired beefy former union bodyguard George Brown and plumbing contractor Vito Iozzo to help him get the job done.
Brown, 51, and Iozzo, 43, each pleaded guilty last year to one count of conspiracy to commit extortion, admitting their roles in several collection attempts that had them jetting off to Wisconsin and New Jersey to find debtors, including one in which a victim was beaten.
Orlando and McManus were convicted in October.
In one extortion that was unrelated to Dzuiban or his company, Brown and Iozzo marched into the owner's office at a Chicago granite company looking to collect on a $500,000 debt, according to Brown's plea agreement with prosecutors.
On Brown's signal, a third man whacked the victim on the head, knocking him to the floor, authorities alleged.
"I told the granite guy, 'Hey mother (expletive), this isn't going to go away,'" Brown admitted in a written statement filed in federal court.
"I hit the granite guy in the head and then (the third man) kicked him. I told the granite guy that we had his phone number and that we would be calling him."
In the Wisconsin case, Dziuban flew Brown and Iozzo on a private plane to Appleton to confront a business owner about a $100,000 debt his company allegedly owed to American Litho, prosecutors said.
The Wisconsin victim testified during the October trial that he and Dziuban met alone in the back room of a Fuddruckers and he offered to hand over a special-edition Ford Mustang as partial payment. Brown and Iozzo walked in, pulled up chairs beside him and started making threats, saying they wouldn't forget the money he owed and "are not nice when they don't get when they want," the victim said.
