Three city workers with ties to then-Streets and Sanitation Commissioner Al Sanchez--including his personal driver--received coveted truck-driving licenses through City Hall without getting the required training.

The workers should have undergone two weeks of behind-the-wheel instruction before obtaining their licenses.

Instead, they skipped the training, and a Streets and Sanitation supervisor called in another worker from disability leave to certify that they were qualified to drive trucks, according to records and interviews.

The licenses entitled the workers to higher pay--in the case of Sanchez's driver, it led to a nearly 39 percent increase in his salary.

The trucking licenses appear to be just one more perk doled out by city officials to reward friends and political allies.

In a broadening corruption scandal inside Mayor Richard Daley's administration, federal prosecutors have charged that city officials routinely showered political workers with jobs, promotions and overtime. Authorities have alleged that city officials have engaged in "massive fraud" involving rigged job tests and sham interviews to ensure politically connected applicants were hired.

As head of Streets and Sanitation until he retired in June, Sanchez oversaw a department that is now under federal scrutiny for alleged abuses of longstanding court orders against patronage. Sanchez also was a leader of the Hispanic Democratic Organization, a pro-Daley political group with hundreds of members on the city payroll, including more than 200 in Streets and Sanitation alone.

Sanchez, who has not been charged with wrongdoing, could not be reached for comment.

In response to questions from the Tribune, city officials said Friday they were investigating whether other Streets and Sanitation employees were improperly licensed through the city. They also said the department recently stopped assisting employees in obtaining trucking licenses.

City Hall last month moved to fire the Streets and Sanitation official who oversaw driver testing but did not disclose that the drivers who did not get the required training had ties to Sanchez. The city had investigated the three drivers, but it took no disciplinary action against them, saying it lacked sufficient evidence.

The state in 2003 summoned the drivers for new tests because of public-safety concerns. Two did not show up to be re-tested, and Sanchez's personal driver failed the test, according to the secretary of state's office.

Sanchez's driver, J. Efrain Sanchez, who is no relation, has done political work for candidates supported by the Hispanic Democratic Organization. Efrain Sanchez, 30, now works in the city's rodent-control bureau.

Robert Aguirre and John Carroll were the two other workers who received licenses without proper training, according to city records.

Aguirre, 23, was a political worker who has been paid more than $7,000 by HDO and candidates backed by the group, according to campaign finance records. Carroll, 26, is the son of the owner of a South Side bar frequented by Al Sanchez, according to interviews.

Both Carroll and Aguirre were student interns when they obtained their trucking licenses. Carroll no longer works for the city, and Aguirre still works in Streets and Sanitation.

Efrain Sanchez, Carroll and Aguirre could not be reached for comment.

In early 1999, Al Sanchez crashed and demolished a city car after attending a fundraiser for an aldermanic candidate supported by HDO. After he became commissioner in May 1999, the city provided him with a driver because of his demanding job, a department spokesman said.

Investigators first started looking into the trucking licenses in 2003, after a police officer pulled over Al Sanchez's city-owned SUV for speeding on the Chicago Skyway. Efrain Sanchez, who was driving, was ticketed and later paid a $95 fine.

The Feb. 19, 1999, incident, which occurred just before 1 a.m., was no ordinary traffic stop. In a report about the incident to his commander, Officer Richard Austin wrote that Al Sanchez "was obviously inebriated." The commissioner told Austin he was exempt from traffic laws and that the officer was not authorized to stop his vehicle, the report said.

"He said that it was his highway," Austin said in an interview Thursday.

For his part, Al Sanchez claimed that he and his driver were victims of racial profiling. He filed a formal complaint with the Police Department, alleging that Austin, who is fluent in Spanish, had been "verbally abusive" by wishing him "good night" in Spanish.

Austin was exonerated, but the Inspector General's Office, which looks into alleged misconduct by city employees, heard about the episode and opened an investigation. The probe eventually led to questions about how Efrain Sanchez obtained his trucking license in January 2002.

At that time, Streets and Sanitation workers who wanted commercial driver's licenses could be trained and tested in the department. This was done under the secretary of state's "third-party testing" program, which allows local governments and some businesses to test their own workers through an employee licensed by the state.

Being trained and tested by an employer allows drivers to avoid the expense of attending a driving school, which can cost thousands of dollars.

For years, the person in charge of testing drivers for Streets and Sanitation was Gerry Sarussi. Sarussi's lawyer said Sarussi was active in a political group run by former Deputy Streets and Sanitation Commissioner Daniel Katalinic. Katalinic, whose group was mostly made up of department workers and others seeking city jobs, is cooperating with the federal investigation of City Hall.

In January 2002, Sarussi was on disability leave after falling from a city truck.

While he was home recuperating from shoulder surgery, Sarussi got a call from a high-ranking boss, Streets and Sanitation Assistant General Supt. Guy Di Turi. Di Turi asked Sarussi to certify Efrain Sanchez for a trucking license, according to a transcript of Sarussi's interview with city investigators.

Sarussi told city investigators that Di Turi knew Sarussi was at home on disability leave, according to the transcript. Sarussi also told investigators that Di Turi informed him that Efrain Sanchez was the commissioner's driver.

According to the transcript, Sarussi said that he and Di Turi were longtime friends and that he agreed to test Efrain Sanchez as a favor to Di Turi.

"When you're asked to do a driving test for the commissioner's driver, you do it," said Sarussi's lawyer, Joseph Spingola. "City workers do all kinds of stuff to curry favor."

Di Turi said in an interview that he did not know Sarussi was on disability at the time because he reached him by pager. Di Turi also said he was not aware when he talked to Sarussi that Efrain Sanchez was Al Sanchez's driver.

Sarussi told investigators that he gave Efrain Sanchez a driving test in a garbage truck Jan. 11, 2002, and signed papers stating that Sanchez was qualified to obtain a trucking license.

Sarussi said he did not give Efrain Sanchez any training because Efrain Sanchez claimed he already had been trained by the Police Department. Sarussi did not ask for any proof of prior training, and city records show that Sanchez never worked for the Chicago Police Department.

The state issued Efrain Sanchez a trucking license later in January. His city job title changed from administrative assistant to motor truck driver, boosting his annual pay by more than $15,000 from $39,552 to $54,945.

After passing Efrain Sanchez, Sarussi also that month came in from disability leave to test Carroll and Aguirre. Sarussi told investigators he gave road tests to both but not the required behind-the-wheel training.

A fourth driver, Peter Pagliuco, also was tested by Sarussi in January 2002. However, Pagliuco, who already had a trucking license, was seeking to upgrade his license so he could drive bigger trucks and was not required to undergo more training.

City investigators interviewed Sarussi in July 2003. Pagliuco, who also talked with investigators that month, voluntarily relinquished his upgraded license soon afterward.

"I didn't want to be involved in anything illegal," Pagliuco said. "I can't afford to lose my job."

The city alerted the secretary of state's office that there were problems concerning the testing of Efrain Sanchez, Carroll and Aguirre. The state ordered the three in for new testing "in the interest of public safety," said Beth Kaufman, spokeswoman for Secretary of State Jesse White.

Carroll and Aguirre did not show up for re-testing in September 2003, Kaufman said. She said Efrain Sanchez took the test but failed. The state canceled the three licenses.
The following year, both Aguirre and Efrain Sanchez took the test again, this time at a secretary of state facility. Both passed and received new trucking licenses.

For reasons that are not clear, Inspector General Alexander Vroustouris did not complete his investigation into the trucking licenses until June of this year. He delivered the results to Daley's chief of staff, Ron Huberman, and the city moved to fire Sarussi.

On June 22, just days later, the Daley administration forced out Vroustouris, citing the long-delayed licensing probe as an example of problems in his office. At that time, however, city officials did not disclose Al Sanchez's ties to the workers who got the licenses.

Vroustouris declined to comment.

Sarussi, who has worked for the city for nearly 30 years, is fighting City Hall's attempt to fire him. Spingola, Sarussi's lawyer, said nothing that Sarussi might have done would warrant dismissal.

"He provided as much training as he was instructed to provide," Spingola said.

A year after his run-in with Al Sanchez, Officer Austin was transferred against his wishes to patrolling a beat in Rogers Park. He blamed the unwanted move largely on his decision to ticket the commissioner's driver for speeding.

Austin filed a union grievance and in May was transferred back to traffic enforcement. The next time he encounters a top city official, Austin said he might respond differently.

"I think I'm more apt to be a little more timid because I don't want to go through any more hassles," he said. "Doing the right thing gets you in trouble."

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