Ald. Proco Moreno sued by ex-girlfriend for defamation a day after charges he falsified theft of car

May 16-- May 16--Liliya Hrabar thought someone might be playing a practical joke when Chicago police pulled her over in February and said the car she was driving had been reported stolen by her boyfriend, Ald. Proco "Joe" Moreno.

The 35-year-old insurance broker from Des Plaines said she had been in regular contact with Moreno since borrowing the Audi A6 from him a few weeks earlier. When police placed her under arrest on Feb. 4, she said, she started looking around for a hidden camera.

"I couldn't believe that happened," the Ukraine native said in a thick accent Thursday at a news conference shortly after filing a defamation lawsuit against Moreno. "That's why I keep saying there's a hidden camera somewhere. I keep thinking that's a joke."

When officers placed handcuffs on her, however, she said her "nightmare" began.

"When I realized ... what's going on, I just started to cry," she said. "I had like a panic attack."

Hrabar's lawsuit alleged Moreno's false story to police about the borrowed car had damaged her reputation and cost her "numerous business clients."

The five-page lawsuit filed in Cook County Circuit Court upped the legal woes for Moreno, who was criminally charged Wednesday with insurance fraud, disorderly conduct, obstruction of justice and falsely reporting a vehicle stolen.

At the news conference at her lawyer's Loop office, Hrabar alleged for the first time that Moreno pressured her to keep quiet about the embarrassing situation until the alderman's re-election bid on Feb. 26.

"He was like, 'You know what, let me go through election. I will explain everything to you,'" Hrabar said. "'I will fix everything. I will make everything work perfect, no worries, no worries.'"

Those allegations were not contained in the defamation lawsuit.

Moreno's criminal defense lawyer, Camilo Oceguera, could not immediately be reached for comment.

Moreno wound up losing to newcomer Daniel La Spata. His term ends Monday.

The allegations in the suit largely mirrored those presented by Cook County prosecutors during Moreno's bond hearing Wednesday. On Jan. 3, Moreno loaned his leased Audi to Hrabar, who took a ride-share to his home in the Wicker Park neighborhood to pick up the keys, according to the suit.

After Moreno watched her drive away from his house, he texted her with a request not to smoke in the car, the suit said.

The next day, Moreno called 911 to report his car stolen, saying he had last seen it parked in front of his home about 9 p.m. the previous day.

Less than an hour later, he called his insurance carrier, State Farm, to report that the car had been stolen from his garage, saying he may have left the garage door open and the key in the ignition.

"Moreno was very clear that he was the last person to use the vehicle and he was the only person with access to the car," prosecutors said in court Wednesday.

Based on that claim, the insurance company was poised to pay $30,000 to cover the loss of the vehicle.

About a month later, Chicago police pulled Hrabar over as she drove the Audi.

"(Hrabar) was surprised by the officers when they informed her that the vehicle had been reported stolen," the suit alleged. "She was readily able to identify the vehicle owner and she was in possession of the vehicle's keys."

When police were unable to reach Moreno, Hrabar was arrested on a charge of criminal trespass to a vehicle, according to the lawsuit and prosecutors. Hrabar's attorney, Michael Gallagher, said at the news conference Thursday that police body cameras captured Hrabar sobbing uncontrollably as she was led into the lockup.

Later that same day, Moreno told a TV news interviewer that he had given the car to a woman with whom he was in a relationship but that he had a hard time getting in touch with her and had reported the car stolen.

"She's a single mom who I'm trying to help out," he told the reporter, according to prosecutors who read excerpts from the TV interview in court Wednesday. "You know, the road to hell is paved with good intentions."

The charges against Hrabar were dropped by prosecutors Feb. 5, and police opened an investigation into a possible false police report.

Hrabar, who has a 14-year-old son, said Thursday she was afraid to go back to her house for several weeks after the story hit the news. Reporters were hounding her, police were trying to serve her with a subpoena to testify and business clients were dumping her because they thought she was a criminal, she said.

"I have so many canceled policies because of (this)," Hrabar said. "People stopped trusting me. To be honest, I changed my hair color to dark because I thought people would not recognize me."

She said she filed her lawsuit against Moreno to hold him accountable for the damage done to her reputation.

"I know him for a long time," she said. "I don't want anything bad to happen to him, but I think he has to take responsibility for what he's done."

She said she'd met the alderman at a business event in September and "really liked him from the beginning."

"He was so nice and sweet to me," she said.

But when she saw him on the news claiming he couldn't reach her, she knew she could no longer trust him.

"I don't want to have him in my life anymore," she said. "Because, you know, the person who does something like that to me, I do not want to deal with people like that."

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