Pavlins keep the pressure on Sheriff

Cal Skinner publishes an interesting photograph of the interior of the Pavlin residence on his McHenry County Blog (www.mchenrycountyblog.com) and includes the caption, "This Sheriff's Department photo indicates some McHenry County Sheriff's Deputy was upstairs in a case in which the homeowners were not present with a search warrant.. "

I recall reading reports of deputies' milling around the Pavlin residence and refusing to leave, but this is my first awareness that a deputy went upstairs.

I always wondered why Carl accepted a negotiated plea in the first place, except for the expense of defending himself for months and months in court. What if he had waited for Judge Kapala to rule that the deputies illegally entered his parents' residence? Did his lawyer tell him of a possible "illegal arrest" defense? Would Carl's case have been thrown out?

After Carl was quickly handcuffed and removed to a squad car, every deputy should have left the house, especially after Mr. and Mrs. Pavlin ordered them out. The Pavlins didn't want their home "tossed"; Mr. Pavlin told me of the condition of Carl's residence after a previous search by deputies. The Pavlins didn't want their possessions strewn all over by deputies' careless "search".

Plus, they had nothing to search for. And no legal reason to search.

Mr. Pavlin was "taken down" to the floor by one deputy with an "arm bar". The deputy wrote in his report that he "assisted" Mr. Pavlin to the ground. What crap! Mrs. Pavlin said the deputy slammed her 80-year-old husband to the floor. Was it a case of police brutality, on top of everything else? And was that deputy "coached" in his report-writing, so that his "assistance" to Mr. Pavlin would look, in writing, like he had just helped an elderly man to the floor? B.S.!!!

But the long arm of the law reached out and charged both Mr. and Mrs. Pavlin with criminal charges, which cost them a lot of money in legal defense fees until the State's Attorney's office dismissed the charges. Mrs. Pavlin had even dialed 9-1-1 for help, but she was told that the police were already there. Yes, they were. The police (deputies) who were harming them were already there!

This case deserves to stay on the front page of the Northwest Herald. Of course, it does not reflect favorably on the McHenry County Sheriff's Department.

Cal Skinner's persistence is to be praised. And the continued persistence of bloggers in McHenry County to file FOIA requests and demand documentation of cases, including photographs, in-car videos and photographs of crime scenes, is also to be praised.