Suburban Chicago woman says she paid $390 deposit for food truck that never came to party
The arrival of a food truck was supposed to be a highlight of one Lake County, Illinois, family's graduation party — but when the food truck they booked didn't show, it turned into a heartbreaking lesson.
The family said they wanted to share their story so others don't make the same mistake.
"When I woke up the next day, I thought, I can't let this happen to another family," said scam victim Kim Koukal of Antioch.
Koukal had a warning to other would-be taco truck customers that the man who recruited her business never showed up to the family's Saturday graduation party. Days later, her daughter's graduation gown was still hanging in their home — in room shared by some paper plates that never got used because the taco truck never came.
"Because other families are going to have parties, and I didn't want any other child to be disappointed like my daughter was," Koukal said.
Koukal said she was contacted by a man using the name Arnold Vallejo and Arnold's Taco Truck when she looked for vendors on a food truck Facebook group. She said she signed the contract Vallejo sent, and sent him $390 via Zelle as a deposit — a figure amounting to half the total estimate for his services.
But communication slowed as the party approached, and a last call to confirm the event was never returned.
"Nothing. And then the afternoon, nothing, and the evening, nothing," said Koukal, "and then I started to get sick to my stomach. I could not sleep."
CBS News Chicago got a hold of that food truck vendor by phone. He said he didn't make the appointment because he is currently hospitalized, and will be refunding her money.
But CBS News Chicago also found evidence of similar situations with other customers of Arnold's Taco Truck going back years.
In September 2022, the Better Business Bureau investigated another complaint alleging the truck never showed to an appointment. Vallejo said that was not his business on the complaint, but the phone number and web address matched photos posted on Facebook.
Koukal found more Facebook users who claimed Vallejo never showed. He did not respond to CBS News Chicago's questions about those.
"I thought she did really amazing despite the last-minute changes," Koukal's daughter, recent graduate Madison Koukal, said of her mom's efforts. "I thought she made the most of it, and it was really good."
Koukal's daughters and friends said they still had fun.
"It goes down in the history, a little story now," said recent graduate Lily Loos. "But I honestly think like, if you showed up, and you didn't know there was supposed to be a taco truck, like, you probably wouldn't have known."
But Kim Koukal wants to make sure nobody else spends hundreds of dollars with no food to show for it.
"Well, at least I had all those appetizers," she said.
The food truck owner said he was going to refund Kim Koukal immediately. But as of Monday night, he still had not done so.
