On Wednesday, a McHenry County Sheriff's deputy failed to show up in court for a trial of a Prairie Grove cop who rear-ended a car on February 4, resulting in the cop's walking out of the courtroom without any penalties at all.
I filed a FOIA request this morning to view the crash report and learn the deputy's name. When yesterday's call to a Patrol commander at MCSD was returned this afternoon, I wasn't given the name and was told to await the FOIA response. Normal turn-around on FOIA Requests is five days.
So much for transparency in government, right? Well, if they want a mountain out of a molehill, this is a good way to put down another layer.
Another way to handle it, of course, would have been to provide the deputy's name.
In response to my question about whether failing to show up in court is a pretty serious matter, I was told that the deputy was expected to be in court "unless he had a good reason." And, if he didn't, then he might get talked to a couple of times, and then progressive discipline might kick in.
Sorry, but I don't buy that one. If he is supposed to be in court as a prosecution witness, it's not optional. It's part of his job. He'll get paid for showing up, if he wasn't already on duty. If he suffered a line-of-duty injury the night before, then his supervisor ought to be in court to explain that to the judge, and I'm sure the judge would continue the case and not just let the defendant walk out.
So now I have to wait for the FOIA response period to run. Look for the next article in a week or so, unless I have time to go to the courthouse and look up the ticket.
You never know who is interested…
3 months ago
2 comments:
Either check the Accident report or check with the clerks office and see who signed the ticket.
Radar, thanks.
The only way I know of to get at the crash report is a FOIA request, and I submitted that this morning.
I can go by the Clerk's office and try to make out the signature on the ticket. Unfortunately, more and more departments allow their officers to scrawl their names illegibly.
It shouldn't take an executive order from the sheriff or police chief (or mayor) to direct officers to sign their names legibly, but it will probably come to that, if enough people scream loudly enough.
MCSD crash reports carry a deputy's badge or ID number, which means a call to learn who he is.
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