Jared Leonard came to Colorado in 2018 with big plans. He initially was just going to open Au Feu, a smoked-meat shop, at the upcoming Zeppelin Station food hall. But then he decided to bring two more of his Chicago-based restaurants (which had gotten into legal trouble in the Windy City) to Denver.
“I was supposed to open Au Feu and then go back to Chicago,” Leonard told Westword that February. “I was going to be here six months, so I brought my wife and kids. They loved it so much, and we decided this quality of life is so much better for us.”
But Leonard is definitely back in Chicago now: Last week he was arrested and indicted on federal wire fraud charges, accused of applying for more than $1.6 million in pandemic relief loans under the Paycheck Protection Program and Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act. But most of that money never made it to any of his restaurants, not in Chicago or in Colorado, where he’d gone on to start several other spots, including the Michel...
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