He has developed millions of dollars worth of real estate and pursued megabuck deals from coast to coast.
He has been convicted of income-tax fraud and has battled state and federal environmental agencies over his controversial developments in Oakbrook Terrace and Lakemoor.
He has formed and folded dozens of corporations, and his aggressive business tactics have engendered a flood of lawsuits and bloodied a number of former business associates.
Through it all, Robert R. Krilich, 61, the controversial Warrenville-based developer, has operated with an intense conviction that whatever he did was right, former associates say.
”Bob Krilich was the type of man that believed in whatever he did or said, no matter what it is,” said Daniel Pappas, a friend of more than 30 years and former in-house attorney for the developer. ”He was convinced in the correctness of his ways.”
Krilich`s forceful style and bold deal-making, which made the former South Side carpenter a multimillionaire, now have made him a figure in a federal investigation.
On Dec. 6 federal agents delivered a subpoena to Krilich seeking his business records. The subpoena came a day after federal agents had delivered subpoenas to Oakbrook Terrace, Niles and Lakemoor seeking records pertaining to zoning and bond issues. The records are to be turned over for consideration by a grand jury in Chicago.
Repeated attempts to reach Krilich have been unsuccessful. Dennis Berkson, Krilich`s attorney, said, ”My client has declined to be interviewed at this time.” Berkson declined to reveal Krilich`s whereabouts.
Krilich has not been identified as a target in the investigation, but Nicholas Blase, mayor of Niles, and Richard F. Sarallo, mayor of Oakbrook Terrace, said federal agents sought information about Krilich`s dealings with the villages.
Richard Troy, Niles village attorney, confirmed that federal officials were interested in a shopping center that Krilich had owned there, as well as in the bonds the city issued to advance the sale of the deteriorating facility to a Denver developer.
Interviews with Krilich`s friends and former associates and a review of court and municipal records reveal a man who devoured adversaries and property alike. His most ambitious deals-a $75 million hotel complex in California, an exotic indoor mall in Florida-never materialized, but Krilich owns more than 250 parcels of land in the Chicago area alone, including property in South Barrington, Des Plaines, Palatine, Lisle, Schiller Park and Glenview.
Friends said Krilich changed from a ”down-to-earth man with a hammer in his hand” early in his career to a high roller who liked visiting Las Vegas and Atlantic City and thought nothing of spending $75 on a glass of cognac for an associate or picking up prospective investors in his private helicopter for a round of golf at one of his courses.
Colleagues, however, said Krilich did not worry about his popularity when it came to business. Gerald Biehl, president of Biehl and Co. in Denver, bought Krilich`s Lawrencewood Shopping Center in Niles after the village condemned it in 1988. He said Krilich was not well-liked by village officials and residents, ”but he wouldn`t have it any other way. He prides himself in that.”
Pappas said business ventures with Krilich often proved risky for those involved.
”He`s not the type of man you want to go in partners with because you are going to be eaten out alive,” Pappas said. ”He`s the type of man that is going to do his own thing and needs complete control of everything.”
Several former partners are suing Krilich in Du Page County Circuit Court, alleging that Krilich sold off 150 lots in Carol Stream and never distributed the proceeds to the other partners.
Pappas said Krilich was brilliant when it came to making money.
”He had a way of doing things that could make a buck,” Pappas said. The two men parted ways in a dispute over legal fees in 1984.
Krilich is also a man of vision, according to his former wife. Lillian Krilich, who divorced him in 1985 after 30 years of marriage and six children, said, ”He liked building and making something out of nothing. He could see a piece of land and envision a city there.”
Krilich, who dropped out of school in 1946 after his first year at Bowen High on the South Side, got his start in the construction business as a carpenter. For three years he worked for a Chicago builder before beginning his own company, South Shore Construction, in the late 1940s.
”I know he started out with no money,” said William Dolan, who was an accountant for Krilich from 1973 to 1985. ”He started building for various people and got the contacts and decided to go out on his own.”
Krilich worked diligently in the early years, according to those around him.
”He worked with the men on the job,” said Lillian Krilich. ”He wasn`t afraid to get his hands dirty. He would climb right up on the roof with the roofers to make sure the job was done right.”
His efforts paid off handsomely. By the time Pappas met him in 1957, Krilich had built acres of townhomes and had purchased and begun developing several tracts.
Pappas said that in the 1950s Krilich had built scores of townhouses in the Niles area between Potter and Greenwood Avenues off Dempster Street.
”There must have been thousands (of units),” Pappas said. ”Oh yeah, he was building like crazy at the time.”
By the early 1960s he had built Lawrencewood Shopping Center and the Greenwood Estates subdivision, both in Niles.
But with success came problems. According to court records, Krilich underreported his 1963 income tax by nearly $150,000. Records show that he owed the government $118,585 in taxes on income of $246,942. Krilich admitted to owing the government $51,978.
In June 1971, Krilich received an 18-month sentence and a $5,000 fine. The court ruled that Krilich had full knowledge of misinformation on his tax return that involved the sale and purchase of property in Schiller Park.
According to court records, Krilich attempted to conceal the profit he made by including the costs of electrical work for Lawrencewood Shopping Center and $200,000 for sewers that were never installed. Krilich`s accountant testified that Krilich instructed him to make the entries.
Krilich served the sentence, but it did not derail his businesses. A few close associates kept them operating while he was in prison. Lillian Krilich said her former husband sold off much of his property and managed to keep things together with earnings from investments.
When Krilich emerged from prison, he resumed acquiring and developing property, expanding his interests during the next decade to include purchases in Florida and Tennessee.
While Krilich was exploring deals in other states, several of his projects in Illinois began to falter, including an apartment complex in Lakemoor and plans for apartments and a shopping center in Oakbrook Terrace.
In Oakbrook Terrace, a plan to build one 31-story and two 27-story apartment buildings and a 500,000-square-foot shopping center ran afoul of state and federal environmental protection agencies in 1988 when contractors for Krilich began draining a York Park District fishing lake. The issue of damage to the lake is still wending through federal court.
In Lakemoor, a Krilich apartment complex was cited by the village in 1988 for allowing more than a dozen residents to move in without occupancy permits. The complex, the Four Seasons of Sullivan Lake, later secured the permits after the state EPA approved the complex`s water system.
Lawrencewood Shopping Center also figured prominently in Krilich`s long-running battles with the Village of Niles.
By the 1980s the center sank into disrepair.
”Bob wouldn`t put a dime into it to improve it,” said Pappas. ”The thing was just going down the tubes.”
Troy, Niles` village attorney, said he inspected the theater during the early 1980s while it was in operation. He painted a bleak picture of standing water, cracked toilet bowls and rugs ”soaked with garbage.”
”The rats were so big you could throw a saddle on them,” he said.
Troy said the condition of the shopping center was a continual source of confrontation between Krilich and the village.
As a result of the center`s chronic deterioration, Niles moved to condemn the shopping center and created incentives to foster redevelopment, issuing $4.5 million in bonds to improve the property and surrounding area.
After the village offered to issue the bonds, Krilich was able to sell the property for $13.5 million to Biehl, the Denver developer. The village had appraised the property at $5.6 million, and Biehl said that Krilich had asked for $17 million.
Biehl said the bonds were an important part of the deal, adding, ”Nobody could have done it without that.”
Biehl, however, discounted any notion that the bonds would prove a fruitful area of investigation for federal agents.
”It was a straightforward deal, and a jillion attorneys and bond guys were there,” he said.
He added, ”I know there are grand juries running around out there, but I think the bones are buried elsewhere.”
