A former Cook County Assessor's Office supervisor who spent years secretly recording colleagues and contractors for the FBI has been sentenced to a year and a half of probation instead of prison time. Ladvim Memisovski, 47, of Summit, pleaded guilty in 2022 to one count of bribery conspiracy after admitting he took free home improvements, jewelry, meals and sports tickets in exchange for slashing commercial property tax assessments.
Memisovski's sentence, handed down this week, was reported by the Chicago Tribune, whose Jason Meisner detailed how the former commercial group leader earned about $127,000 annually while running one of the more brazen corners of a sprawling assessor's office corruption scheme. Memisovski joined the assessor's office in 2005 and, according to the Tribune's reporting, routed property-assessment appeals involving contractor Alex Nitchoff and his associates to himself, then extended appeal-filing deadlines for them and reduced their assessed property values.
In return, Memisovski accepted a long list of home improvements at his Summit residence — a concrete pad, decking materials, dumpster usage, fascias, soffits, a fence, a gas line, sprinkler-system heads, tile and windows — all supplied by Oakk Construction, according to the same account. He also took jewelry, meals and sporting-event tickets from Nitchoff, the Tribune reported. John Bodendorfer, who oversaw the work and materials installed at Memisovski's home, once thanked Memisovski for a very low tax bill in a message dated July 17, 2018, per the Tribune's account.
Wired Up: More Than 400 Calls, Nearly 100 Meetings
What set Memisovski apart from other bribe-takers in the case was his decision to cooperate. He agreed to work undercover with the FBI, wearing a hidden wire on at least one target of an investigation and ultimately recording more than 400 phone calls and nearly 100 in-person meetings, the Tribune reported. That cooperation helped federal prosecutors charge former assessor's office colleagues and developers, and Memisovski also cooperated against individuals who have not yet been criminally charged.
Prosecutor Richard Rothblatt recommended two years of probation for Memisovski, telling the court that his corruption erodes confidence in the tax-assessment system, according to the Tribune. Memisovski ultimately received a year and a half of probation — a lighter outcome than the up-to-five-year sentence originally contemplated when he entered his guilty plea in August 2022, when prosecutors agreed to seek probation if he fulfilled his undercover obligations, as The Real Deal reported at the time.
Memisovski isn't alone in getting a break for flipping. Former chief hearings officer Francisco Perez pleaded guilty to taking bribes to fix property tax assessments and was sentenced in July 2025 to two years of probation, after secretly recording colleagues and offering what The Real Deal described as “critical” early cooperation. Field inspector Basilio Clausen, who admitted taking perks including golf club outings to lower tax bills for select property owners, was convicted in connection with the investigation and received three years of probation from U.S. District Judge Matthew Kennelly earlier this year, according to State and Federal Communications.
Contractor Got Five Years While Insiders Walked
The contrast with Nitchoff's fate is stark. The Summit-based Oakk Construction owner pleaded guilty in the bribery scheme and was sentenced in 2024 to five years in prison, a punishment Hoodline covered in prior reporting on his sentencing. U.S. District Judge John F. Kness, who handed down that sentence despite numerous character letters supporting Nitchoff, remarked at the time that property tax bribery schemes act as a cancer that erodes public trust in government institutions, according to the Daily Herald. Nitchoff gave Memisovski jewelry, meals, sporting-event tickets and other items, according to the Tribune's account. John Bodendorfer, who oversaw the improvements at Memisovski's home, also pleaded guilty in the scheme and received a sentence of probation this year.
Not every case tied to Memisovski's cooperation ended in conviction. Fence Masters owner Robert Mitziga was acquitted of charges involving golf outings for Memisovski at a club in Bridgman, Michigan, after telling a jury the invitations were personal rather than quid-pro-quo bribes, Patch reported. Prosecutors had called Memisovski and Clausen to testify against Mitziga at that trial. Separately, prosecutors did not call Memisovski to testify against John Kosmowski, who was convicted in 2025 of taking a bribe from a bar owner seeking a liquor-license transfer, and charges against Memisovski's cousin, former assessor's office employee Lumni Likovski, were dropped by the U.S. Attorney's Office before trial.
Overlap With Ald. Carrie Austin's Stalled Case
The investigation that ensnared Memisovski also bled into a separate City Hall scandal. Nitchoff's business dealings sparked an FBI raid on then-Ald. Carrie Austin's office in June 2019, and Austin later stepped down from her aldermanic seat while facing bribery charges before being deemed medically unfit for trial. Her former chief of staff, Chester Wilson, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor unrelated to Oakk Construction and was given probation, a resolution Hoodline reported this July after bribery allegations against him were dropped.
The scheme took root under former Assessor Joseph Berrios, who led the assessor's office and served as boss of the Cook County Democratic Party before losing his bid for a third term in 2018. His successor, Fritz Kaegi, subsequently established a strict employee ethics code, online visitor sign-in logs and two-step managerial approval controls for commercial property assessment appeals, according to WTTW, changes meant to eliminate the kind of single-employee valuation authority that let Memisovski steer cases to himself for years.
