Ex-Glendale Heights president pleads guilty to perjury

Former Glendale Heights President Chodri Khokhar pleaded guilty Friday to committing perjury when he sought reelection in 2024.

Khokhar agreed to a sentence of two years of second-chance probation. If he complies with the terms of his sentence, the charge will be dismissed.

He will have to perform 30 hours of community service work, and undergo any counseling the probation department deems necessary.

Six forgery charges against Khokhar were dropped as part of the agreement.

Prosecutors also dropped the felony disorderly conduct and misdemeanor battery charges he was facing in a 2023 case.

Khokhar declined to comment Saturday about why he decided to plead guilty.

In the perjury case, he pleaded guilty to a charge that accused him of violating the state Election Code, by falsely stating on his election petition that a woman had signed the petition in his presence. The woman had not signed the petition, according to the charge.

Khokhar had been representing himself in court the past few court dates, including one on April 30 where he told Judge Daniel Guerin that DuPage County state’s attorney’s office investigators had lied under oath to a grand jury about the forgery case.

Earlier in April, he filed a motion that said he had been “wrongfully framed in to malicious prosecution based on his race, skin color and beliefs by political rivals” including the Glendale Heights electoral board, the Glendale Heights police chief and the state’s attorney’s office.

Khokhar was elected president in 2021 by two votes over Mike Ontiveroz. Longtime incumbent Linda Jackson was removed from the race and votes cast for her were not counted, per an Illinois Supreme Court decision shortly before the election.

His four years in office featured heated village board meetings, with him often raising his voice and banging a gavel when trustees or the public disagreed with him.

The disorderly conduct charges accused him of filing false police reports claiming that he told Glendale Heights police that village Trustee Mohammad Siddiqi had threatened to bite him.

The misdemeanor charge was added to the case later. It accused him of shoving Chief George Pappas.

Khokhar sought reelection in 2025, but the village electoral board said his petition exhibited a pattern of fraud, and ruled that it was invalid. Khokhar called the three board members biased, racist and corrupt.