Former businessman gets 8 years for soliciting hit man over $8M debt

A former Lombard businessman was sentenced to eight years in federal prison Monday for hiring a hit man to kill a man to whom he owed $8 million.

During a weeklong trial in August 2013, a jury convicted Daniel Dvorkin of solicitation of murder and five counts of using a telephone and car to commit murder-for-hire, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.

Dvorkin, 76, previously lived in Lombard and worked in commercial real estate, authorities said.

The victim had obtained an $8 million judgment against Dvorkin and two of his businesses, which was to become collectible in May 2012, prosecutors said.

That April, Dvorkin tried to hire a hit man to kill the victim over the multimillion-dollar judgment, but the person he solicited began cooperating with law enforcement, prosecutors said.

Authorities arrested Dvorkin in July 2012. He apparently balked at the price the cooperating individual was negotiating, and investigators feared he would try to find a cheaper hit man, the statement said.

In a government sentencing memo, prosecutors called Dvorkin, “a calm, cool, collected businessman who negotiated the price of a hit man as though he were closing a real estate deal, who showed only real concern for his bank account over the life of [the victim],” the statement said.

U.S. District Judge Edmond Chang handed down the eight-year sentence at a hearing Monday, according to federal prosecutors.