Legal Question in Credit and Debt Law in Illinois

You have basically 2 choices:

1. active pursuit: spend the money to chase the person -- you will have to serve him again with something like a Citation to Discover Assets, or his employer (if you know who that is) with a Wage Garnishment summons. You can get a copy of the check you used to make the downpayment and see if the endorsement is legible and perhaps attempt to garnish the bank account where it was deposited. All of these things cost time and money but you can recoup some of it on the forms you fill out. Garnishments are nice because the actual judgment debtor doesn't have to do anything.

2. Record a general judgment lien against the person -- then if he wants credit in the future this will show up and very possibly could prevent him from getting credit until you are taken care of (with interest, etc., if provided for in your judgment).

3. You can do a combo of the above, or if he worked for a company start hammering them. If this guy had a company or worked for one go to www.cyberdriveillinois.com and under business services see if you can get more information about the company. Or you can report him to the Illinois Attorney General Consumer Fraud & Protection area, or the Better Business Bureau, or if you know the brand of windows check with them and see if he was really a rep or salesperson? Good luck. Getting the judgment is only half the "fun"; many judgments are "uncollectible" either because the people you get judgments against have no assets or money, or just can't be found.... Worst case is that you may be able to write off the matter for tax purposes in the nature of a theft loss.