Moroccan who posed as Pablo Escobar's son guilty of extortion, had mixed with Chicago power brokers

A former top aide to the governor.

A member of a state board that oversees stadiums.

A top-notch Chicago restaurateur.

They’re among the people with whom Jawad Fakroune — a past felon who was convicted Tuesday of a violent extortion scheme — managed to develop close relationships, according to court testimony. He's scheduled to be sentenced June 30.

Lisa Duarte, who was a first assistant deputy governor under Gov. JB Pritzker on his budget and economy team, is now a lobbyist. She dated Fakroune and helped arrange to have the state renegotiate past-due taxes for the restaurant owner Fakroune was extorting, jurors heard during the trial before U.S. District Court Judge Manish Shah.

Patricia “Trish” Rooney, a board member of the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority, whose father was chief executive officer of Waste Management, also dated Fakroune, according to testimony. She was at a restaurant table with Fakroune when he pulled a gun on his restaurant partner Adolfo Garica a few years ago.

And Phil Stefani, whose popular restaurants include Tavern on Rush in the Gold Coast, introduced Fakroune to Garcia, whom Fakroune roughed up in 2024, demanding Garcia repay him $1.5 million.

During the six-day trial, jurors learned that Fakroune masqueraded as Angelino Escobar, a son of the late Colombian cartel kingpin Pablo Escobar — even though Fakroune doesn’t speak Spanish. He was a well-known patron at Chicago’s top restaurants favored by wealthy diners, politically-connected leaders and sports stars.

At the start of the trial for the 46-year-old Moroccan national, Fakroune's defense attorney Damon Cheronis told jurors they were about to learn that “the restaurant industry in Chicago is cutthroat.”

Cheronis sought to portray Garcia as a bad business partner and fraudster — and not a victim. Cheronis argued Garcia spent money from his restaurants to pay himself, his ex-wife and other partners instead of Fakroune. Many of those restaurants quickly failed.

But prosecutors played hours of secret recordings in which Fakroune demanded repayment of money he gave Garcia, sometimes along with threats like: “I’m going to bury you. I’m going to kill you and your kids, I promise you. I’m going to f—- your wife and your children. I’m going to murder you before they get me.”

Jurors also saw a video from a hidden FBI camera in which Fakroune slapped Garcia in the face in a River North restaurant on Nov. 21, 2024. Prosecutors said Fakroune punched and kicked Garcia, too, although that wasn’t clear because the men were standing behind a column at the time.

Under hours of questioning, Garcia admitted he “sucked” as a restaurateur, conceding he failed to pay hundreds of thousands in taxes from the Illinois Departments of Revenue and Labor.

He used two attorneys — Duarte and Sean Mulroney — to negotiate a payment plan with the state so he could obtain a state liquor license in 2024 for a new restaurant, Americano, in the Hotel Lincoln, 1816 N. Clark St.

Duarte had worked for Mayor Rahm Emanuel and later the governor, overseeing several state agencies. She then became a sought-after lobbyist with blue-chip clients, including Nicor Gas, the Chicago Transit Authority, the Chicago Bears and the White Sox.

Duarte was in Springfield, working as a lobbyist, while she was repeatedly mentioned during the trial, including in secret recordings of Fakroune calling her his girlfriend.

The property tax bills on Fakroune’s Lemont estate were sent to Duarte’s Lincoln Park home — and she paid them.

Duarte didn’t respond to messages, but last year she told the Chicago Sun-Times: “I believe I’m a small sliver in a long trail of victims.”

Rooney had witnessed Fakroune pull a gun on Garcia inside Yours Truly, the men's now-closed restaurant in River North, according to testimony. She was a girlfriend of Fakroune, according to Garcia’s testimony.

Rooney, who owns an information management company in Bridgeport, is a divorced mother who lives with her children on Chicago’s Gold Coast within walking distance from Pritzker’s home.

Rooney wasn’t called to testify in the trial. She didn’t return messages from the Sun-Times.

Emanuel appointed Rooney to the board of the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority, which owns Rate Field where the Sox play, and helped finance renovations of Soldier Field for the Bears.

She also is a board member of the City Club of Chicago, a civic forum that had long been run by Jay Doherty, who is serving a prison sentence for a bribery scheme involving ComEd and former Illinois House Speaker Michael J. Madigan.

Fakroune met Garcia through Stefani, one of Chicago’s top restaurateurs who operates Tavern on Rush, Tuscany and Castaways on North Avenue Beach.

Stefani also owns the Broken English Taco Pub on Lake Street near Michigan Avenue, a restaurant his website says he created with Garcia, who was born in Mexico.

Stefani wasn’t called to testify in Fakroune’s trial.

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Stefani sold his West Side restaurant Mad Social Club to Fakroune, who partnered with Garcia to reopen it as Dear Madison, one of several restaurants they worked on between 2021 and 2024.

Fakroune invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in the restaurants, money he insisted had to be repaid, regardless of the success of the restaurants, according to court testimony.

There was no testimony to explain the source of the money Fakroune invested in Garcia’s restaurants.

The FBI was already investigating Fakroune in October 2024 when agents showed up to question Garcia. Jurors were never told why the federal government was investigating Fakroune.

The FBI began recording phone calls between the two men when Fakroune accused Garcia of laundering money and selling cocaine, accusations Garcia denied in court.

On Nov. 24, 2024, Fakroune showed up at Yours Truly, confronting Garcia about repayment of $1.5 million. As they argued, Fakroune choked Garcia, kicked him in the leg and punched him in the face while demanding the return of his money.

The next month, on Dec. 18, 2024, federal investigators went to arrest Fakroune at his New York City apartment, but he fled out the window, wearing only a trash bag as he ran down the streets of Manhattan, evidence that was kept from the jury. In the apartment, federal agents found several fake IDs along with guns that had been reported stolen by a Chicago police officer.

Fakroune was arrested at a rental home in Michigan City, Indiana on Jan. 18, 2025. He has been held without bond ever since.

Fakroune is facing another criminal trial for allegedly defrauding investors of $2.6 million that he pledged to invest in a shipping container company and a marijuana farm. Prosecutors say he spent the money on himself, including the property in Lemont, his New York City apartment and high-end watches.

Fakroune had entered the United States in 2001 through a “diversity visa program” and became a lawful permanent resident, according to federal authorities.

He was convicted in New York of identity theft, bribery of a public official and other crimes under the alias of Ban Abdrahime, according to prosecutors, who said he served prison time and is now listed as a parole “absconder” by the New York Department of Corrections.

On Tuesday, the New York Police Department provided the Sun-Times with a report for Fakroune’s bribery case. In 2007, police officers were called to Rockefeller Plaza after he signed a woman’s name on a $400 tab and she accused him of fraud. Fakroune then offered to give a cop his $17,000 watch and later pay him $3,000 in cash in exchange for letting him go, the report said.

In 2012, Fakroune was ordered to be deported, but a judge overturned that decision, authorities said.