Before they listened to what’s expected to be weeks of testimony about gruesome murders on Chicago’s streets, a federal prosecutor warned a jury not to be fooled by the man sitting in a wheelchair in the courtroom, wrapped in a blanket.

Labar “Bro Man” Spann has been paralyzed for decades thanks to a 1999 shooting, so he “might not fit the image of a typical murderer,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Emily Vermylen said.

“But make no mistake,” Vermylen said. “The defendant sitting in front of you is a killer. The defendant and his street gang, the Four Corner Hustlers, terrorized the West Side of Chicago for decades.”

What Spann lacked in mobility, she said, he “made up for in his diabolical scheming.”

That’s how the second federal racketeering conspiracy trial of the reputed onetime leader of

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