Greg Pyle - court yesterday?

A reader has informed me that Greg Pyle was in Federal court yesterday in Rockford. Pyle was a sergeant at the McHenry County Sheriff's Department, until his arrest in January 2012 on ten felony charges of predatory criminal sexual abuse of a child under 13 (family). Those were McHenry County charges filed by the Illinois State Police.

Pyle got a sweet deal from Sheriff Nygren, who never - repeat, n-e-v-e-r - took Pyle's arrest to the Sheriff's Department Merit Commission. Pyle drew vacation and sick pay until August 2012, when that well ran dry. Then the Feds stepped in and arrested him on interstate charges.

The Federal judge doesn't have a sense of humor about Pyle and stuck him in the Boone County Jail, where he has spent the past 15 months on a no-bond hold.

No media are reporting regularly on Pyle.

As of today, the Rockford Register-Star doesn't have anything to say about yesterday's court date.

The last article in the Chicago Tribune was August 17, 2012, according to today's search.

The Northwest Herald, which ought to be keeping readers aware of the good, the bad and the ugly about the McHenry County Sheriff's Department, last reported on October 25 that Pyle might be playing "Let's Make a Deal".

Since as many as 90% of convicted persons in prison were not convicted at trial, perhaps a deal isn't all that unusual. Will Pyle rat out other law enforcement officials in exchange for leniency in his own case? Some think he might have information valuable to prosecutors that they might be willing to trade him.

Is it too much to ask of our local county paper that the editors and a strong reporter pay attention to this case?

Pyle's McHenry County case (12CF00020) is languishing in our local court. The rubber stamp with "Continue to next month) must be freshly inked. On December 5 the case was continued to January 6. How many court dates have there been, where virtually nothing happened?

The case was filed 1/9/12. Court dates in 2012 were 1/11, 1/27, 2/21, 3/2, 3/5, 3/9, 4/13, 5/25, 6/14, 7/26, 9/6, 10/15, and 11/15.

2013 court dates have been 1/10, 3/6, 5/13, 7/16, 8/13, 9/12, 11/1 and 12/5.

Whatever happened to "speedy trial"?

UPDATE 12/15/13 Will Pyle enter a plea in January? Wasn't he believed to be ready to enter a plea in December? Why don't judges set trial dates early in a case and force the lawyers to actually practice law?