‘Flying Lady' owner gets 5 years in prison in fraud involving Chicago party yacht with stripper pole
David Izsak, 50, was convicted by a jury in December 2023 of 10 counts of bank fraud and aggravated identity theft, including allegations that he created fictitious loan documents to buy the Flying Lady and also stole the identity of his ailing mother to qualify for a car loan in 2015.
U.S. District Judge Manish Shah sentenced Izsak on Tuesday to 60 months in prison and ordered him to pay about $2.1 million in restitution. The judge also entered a forfeiture judgment of just over $3 million, court records show.
Prosecutors had asked for nearly 13 years behind bars, arguing in a recent filing that as a licensed real estate agent and broker, Izsak earned a handsome six-figure salary yet still chose to use his knowledge of the system to steal.
'Fraud was Izsak's vocation,' Assistant U.S. Attorney Elly Moheb wrote. 'Izsak took steps to conceal his scheme so that he could continue the fraud for years, all to live a lavish lifestyle of party boats, fancy cars, and buckets of cash.'
Izsak's attorney, Nishay Sanan, wrote in a filing of his own that Izsak 'deeply regrets what he did' and is ready to rebuild a productive, lawful life, working recently as a home rehabber and with his fiancé, who owns a real estate and interior design company.
'He has struggled with his mental health due to the stress of this case, has delayed his wedding plans, and has been unsure of what job opportunities he should pursue while facing a potential period of incarceration,' Sanan wrote, asking the judge for as little as six months behind bars.
The sentencing capped a case that stretched over more than six years as investigators tried to unwind Izsak's complex and overlapping frauds. In the process, the Flying Lady, a Carver 570 Voyager that Izsak bought in 2011 for $450,000, was seized by the government and later sold at auction for $325,000, court records show.
Izsak was charged in 2019, but the case was delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic and Izsak's churn through several defense teams. He initially was going to plead guilty but later reversed course and took the case to trial, records show.
After he was convicted, Izsak again changed attorneys and fought the U.S. attorney's office over how much he would owe in restitution.
Adorned with a pink stripper pole attached to the afterdeck, the Flying Lady was a regular sight in the often raucous party spot just off the downtown shore, serving essentially as a floating nightclub, complete with tipsy guests dancing to pulsating DJ music and bikini-clad women performing acrobatic pole moves to the cheers of sun-drenched crowds.
According to prosecutors, Izsak, who owned Skokie-based real estate company Premier Assets Inc., fraudulently obtained $360,000 in financing for the yacht by falsifying his income, submitting bogus tax returns and lying about the status of home equity loans he'd taken out on his home on Chicago's Near West Side.
Also charged as part of the same investigation was Izsak's longtime business associate, Yale Schiff of Riverwoods, and Schiff's brother, Jason Schiff of Lincolnwood. Both brothers pleaded guilty to a count of bank fraud, with Yale Schiff sentenced to three years in prison and his brother receiving a term of probation, court records show.
A 1993 graduate of Niles North High School, Izsak was born in Northbrook and grew up with his family in the north suburbs. His father, Reuven, a Holocaust survivor from Romania whose parents and brother were killed by the Nazis, died in 2010 at 83, according to court records. His mother, who died while the case against her son was pending, also grew up in wartime Romania.
Court records show Izsak filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection in 1997 when he was just 22. He earned his real estate license in 2005 and built a company that bought numerous properties in the Chicago area for rental or resale.
In June 2015, the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation revoked Izsak's license, finding he had 'filed falsified documents with the Cook County Recorder of Deeds, thus enabling him to fraudulently and continually obtain new mortgages from various financial institutions,' according to state online records.
At the time, Izsak was already heavily involved in Chicago's social boating scene, particularly at events at the Playpen, the no-wake area just south of Oak Street Beach where powerboats often raft together and a see-and-be-seen crowd soaks up perfect skyline views.
Flying Lady — with its logo of a woman's silhouette flying through a pink ring — was a fixture at the Playpen for years, often cross-promoting with nightclubs and modeling agencies and offering a day on the lake with the city's most beautiful people.
Slick promotional videos still available on Facebook and other social media sites show professional dancers sliding down the yacht's pole while promoters shake up Champagne bottles and soak crowds seen whooping from the water.
Court records show the Flying Lady remained in government hock until it was sold in 2020 by Spring Brook Marina in Seneca, along the Illinois River about 80 miles southwest of Chicago.
jmeisner@chicagotribune.com
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