Feldkamp estate challenges

On June 7, 2011, Jack and Audrey Feldkamp and Doran Bloom died in McHenry County near Marengo. On June 8 Sheriff Keith Nygren held a press conference and declared how it had happened, apparently basing his conclusion on the hospital-bed statements of Scott Feldkamp given to an investigator just before the press conference. Nygren said, in effect, "Case Closed". Those weren't his words but it seems that, other than report-writing and three Coroners' Inquests, that's all there was.

Probate was opened in the Estate of Audrey Feldkamp on June 15 (only one week later), and the Feldkamp's son, Scott Feldkamp, was appointed executor (independent administrator). Scott was hardly out of the hospital himself, and at the time I thought it was a rather fast filing. An estate inventory was ordered on a rush basis, and then the estate appraiser had to file a claim for payment against the Estate. Did they expect to get paid promptly for their rush work?

On July 13 probate was opened in the Estate of Jack Feldkamp, and Scott Feldkamp was appointed executor in that estate, too, per the terms in the Will.

Two estates are open because of a provision in the Wills that, in order to inherit, the spouse had to survive for 30 days. Mr. Feldkamp died first, and Mrs. Feldkamp died about 2 1/2 hours later. This means that the heirs (son and daughter) inherit what each parent had in his or her estate, after expenses and debts.

The executor has been conducting the estate administrations pro se, meaning without a lawyer since August 30, when the Marengo law firm of Schmitt & Filler asked Judge Sullivan to let them withdraw. They told the judge that they had had problems with communication and cooperation from Scott Feldkamp.

Mark Gummerson was in the courtroom on August 30 and told Judge Sullivan that he represented Jackie Feldkamp. When Judge Sullivan told him no Appearance was in the court jacket, Gummerson said that he had filed one or, if he hadn't, he would. He never did, before or after.


I had heard rumors of how the estate was being administered, but you know what rumors are worth.

However, now petitions have been filed in McHenry County Circuit Court to remove Scott Feldkamp as executor of both estates. The petitions are filed by the Feldkamp's daughter, Jaclynn (Jackie), and allege numerous problems including, but not limited to, conversion of or sale of a $50,000 stock account; an IRA account worth more than $30,000; silver service sets worth more than $20,000; accounting for checking and savings accounts; causing charges to paid credit card accounts and allowing them to go into collection; accounting for personal property, furniture and household goods; and disposing of more than $5,000 worth of Jackie's personal property that was in the home.

The petitions also allege negligence by the executor in failing to make mortgage payments on the residence and allowing it to go into foreclosure; not paying real estate taxes; lapsing homeowners insurance and vehicle insurance policies; letting vehicle registrations expire; leaving Illinois without notifying the Court; leaving the house vacant; threatening Jackie with non-existent and false court orders and getting rid of the family dog.

The Motions will be argued in court on July 20 at 9:30AM in Room 202, the courtroom of Judge Chmiel.

The value of MIAT

What's the value of the McHenry County Major Incident Assistance Team (MIAT)? I've been wondering why it wasn't alerted at the time of the triple homicide in Marengo on June 7, in which Jack Feldkamp, Audrey Feldkamp and Doran Bloom died.

An experienced law enforcement officer has offered this comment.

“In regards to M.I.A.T team, one of the best advantages of this, is having other qualified detectives from other non-involved agencies assisting looking at the same incident, but perhaps from a different view from the other. It's not that you're trying to convict the suspect, but rather review all the evidence, from many different angles, by different people, and see where it takes you. Follow the physical evidence. Does each investigator's trail brings him right back to the same person? By trying to eliminate a suspect, you wont become tunnel blind and concentrate only on what one suspect is telling you.

“If he shot from the angle it was stated, there should be projectile marks in the 

flooring from final rest of the bullets. 

“Where were the shell casings found in regard to the stance the shooter said

he shot from?

“Was there any gun residue recovered from the stair rail area or floor from 

where the shooter said he shot from?

“Do the angles line up from where the shot was fired, to the area on the body? 

"Did the injuries reflect that the bullets came in from above? 

"Were there any bullet holes with a straight shot through the chest area? 

"Which way was the victim facing when he was shot ?

“Did the bullets fired into the victim go straight through him, indicating a 

closer point of impact?”

Law enforcement shootings investigations

How carefully do law enforcement agencies investigate shootings?

Certainly, the actions of the Sanford (Fla.) Police Department have been in the spotlight, since George Zimmerman shot and killed Trayvon Martin on February 26. Police initially bought Zimmerman's story and didn't charge him. Following appointment of a special prosecutor (now, that didn't take two years!) Zimmerman has been charged and jailed.

Closer to home, there was a shooting last June near Marengo. Two elderly residents, John and Audrey Feldkamp, died from stab wounds. Doran Bloom died from gunshot wounds. One person remained - Scott Feldkamp, son of John and Audrey Feldkamp. He suffered stab wounds.

A detective, Travis McDonald, interviewed Scott in the hospital on the following day. Sheriff Keith Nygren quickly held a press conference and announced what had happened on the evening of June 7 in the Feldkamp home.

And on that day, June 8, 2011, the Northwest Herald carried this opening sentence, "The stabbing deaths of an 83-year-old Marengo man and his 81-year-old wife were part of a random act of violence by a suspect with a history of mental health issues, police said."

And the Northwest Herald story contained this: "Scott Feldkamp then broke free from the fight and ran to an upstairs bedroom to get a 9 mm pistol, but Bloom began stabbing Audrey Feldkamp in the meantime, Nygren said."

The article continued, "Leaning over an upstairs banister, Scott Feldkamp was able to shoot Bloom multiple times."

Where did Sheriff Nygren get that? I just re-read Scott's statement to Det. McDonald, and I didn't see that. Maybe it's "between the lines". I'll have to look there.

The conclusion at the Sheriff's Department on the very first day after the deaths? We're done. Case closed.

From the reports in the 260-page file, it appears that the McHenry County Sheriff's Department did little investigation. Apparently, they did not question how Scott could shoot 9-10 times from the second floor balcony and hit Bloom without hitting his father. No reports detailed the trajectory of the bullets or the wounds that Bloom suffered. Why did he carry an unloaded gun downstairs and place it on a small table? The Coroner's report is not part of the sheriff's department report.

The reports do not mention whether (or not) gun powder was found on Bloom's clothing or body.  One report (not from the sheriff's department) indicated the presence of gunpowder, which would only be expected if the weapon were close to the point of impact. The crime scene drawings wouldn't get a passing grade at MCC in a criminology class on a student's first day. No one questioned in the reports why so many casings were found between Bloom and the wall. No drawing compared a logical trajectory of spent casings from the point on the balcony from which the shots were fired with the actual locations of the casings on the first floor.

MIAT should have been called in; it wasn't. What's MIAT? The Major Incident Assistance Team. These are trained cops from around the county with different departments, who have specialized training. Their availability means that any one department doesn't have to maintain the specialties on its staff. When expertise is needed, MIAT is called in. Why wasn't MIAT called for a triple homicide?

What is MIAT? Not used in Feldkamp/Bloom homicides

MIAT is the McHenry County Major Investigations Assistance Team. MIAT is mentioned in the December 2011 Woodstock Police Department report to the City Manager and City Council. Woodstock PD assisted (City of) McHenry PD, when it had two serious incidents within one hour on December 3, 2011.

Various departments in McHenry County make their officers available, when a wide range of investigative specialties is needed. This results in economies to all departments, because they don’t all have to staff up with experts in many investigative areas, often seldom needed, just waiting to be called.

Thinking back to June 2011, I wonder why the McHenry County Sheriff’s Department didn’t request MIAT after MCSD was summoned to the Somerset Drive residence of Jack and Audrey Feldkamp for a triple homicide.

Mr. and Mrs. Feldkamp and neighbor Doran Bloom died as a result of events of that evening, and the Sheriff’s Department quickly concluded its investigation based on the statements of the one injured survivor.

Suppose that expert investigators from various departments had been called in to examine the crime scene. Might these independent officers, who would not have been in a direct-report employment relationship in the sheriff’s department, have come up with different observations, answers and conclusions about what had happened? Would their questions have taken the investigation into different territory?

Did the events occur as related by Sheriff Nygren so quickly in a press conference the following week? Most electronic-news reporters were excluded from the press conference, which could have eliminated some embarrassing questions to the sheriff. If I remember correctly, a Patch.com reporter was admitted, but McHenry County Blog, FirstElectricNewspaper and the Woodstock Advocate were kept out.

Sheriff Nygren made a serious error in excluding local blogger Cal Skinner (McHenry County Blog) and Pete Gonigam, who publishes First Electric Newspaper. I can understand, but not professionally accept, his snubbing me. And it doesn’t have anything to do with my coming in third in the 2010 race for County Sheriff. By letting in only “credentialed” media, Nygren attempted to control the news, knowing their stories would be headlines for a day or two and then be “old news”.

The McHenry County Sheriff’s Department quickly announced a story about what happened, concluded its investigation, and closed the case. I’ve been through the 260-page report of MCSD; it has more holes in it than Swiss Cheese. I could describe it another way, but I’ll refrain. I do expect experts not to be so polite.

The Sheriff’s Department may think that this case is over and done, but it’s not. Speaking on a condition of anonymity, a person close to the case revealed that major, national media are looking very closely at the events of June 7, 2011 and how the investigation was conducted.

Feldkamps & Bloom follow-up

The McHenry County Sheriff's Department seems to have washed its hands on the investigation of the deaths of Jack and Audrey Feldkamp and Doran Bloom. I say this, because the report of the investigation of the Sheriff's Department is now available under the Freedom of Information Act.

If the MCSD were still investigating, they would not release the report.

What is there still to investigate? Well, let's start with what happened that night. I was amazed at the declarations by Sheriff Keith Nygren so quickly after that night's events. He flew back to McHenry County and took the spotlight at a press conference. He declared, in event, "Case Closed." (He did not see fit to return to McHenry County after another murder just a week earlier - that of Kurt Milliman. But that's another story.)

One of my earliest questions was about the weapon used by Scott Feldkamp to shoot Doran Bloom. The first thing I wondered was, "How did Scott just happen to be so accurate with his shooting?" And another question was about whether Scott Feldkamp was in legal possession of a firearm in Illinois. In this state we have a requirement that any adult in possession of a firearm or ammunition must have a Firearm's Owner Identification (FOID) card. Did Scott Feldkamp have a FOID card? If not, why wasn't he charged? Were firearms allowed in the parents' home?

What do police and deputies understand about dealing with subjects who have a mental illness diagnosis? And, in an investigation in which they cannot interview the subject, such as this case, did the investigators and Sheriff Nygren jump to some conclusions?

Someone must speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves.

Are there known circumstances or history that might cause any thorough investigator to ask some deeper questions than have apparently been asked? What if some of those investigators suspected there was more to the story and wanted to pursue their hunches or intuition, or facts? What if they came up with information that sharply contrasted statements by their boss, the sheriff?

Would Nygren allow the investigation to be re-opened? Would he risk embarrassment, or would he admit error if findings contradicted his original, very emphatic explanation of that evening in Marengo?

Does (should?) executor have a lawyer?

When a person is an executor of an Estate, should he have a lawyer? What would the job of the lawyer be?

The lawyer would advise his client, the executor, on probate law. He would tell him what is required. He would tell an executor what he could do. More importantly, the lawyer ought to tell his client what he should not do and cannot do.

Actually, I suspect that a lawyer will not tell a client not to do something that would be a violation of the law. Perhaps his correct duty would be to inform the client what the legal consequences of a violation of a law (often called a "crime") would be.

In the case of the Estates of Jack and Audrey Feldkamp, an elderly couple in the Marengo area who died early in June of this year, the executor appointed under the Wills promptly filed the appropriate legal papers in Mrs. Feldkamp's estate and, later, filed similar papers in Mr. Feldkamp's estate.

The original lawyers, Schmitt & Filler of Marengo, bailed out on the case and filed Petitions to get paid the $8,700 they were already owed. On Tuesday, August 30, Judge Sullivan allowed them to withdraw. The reason given by the lawyers was "lack of communication and cooperation on the part of Scott A. Feldkamp." Scott Feldkamp, son of Jack and Audrey Feldkamp, is the Executor of both estates.

The Order by Judge Sullivan allowed Schmitt & Filler to withdraw was entered, and the name of that law firm has been removed from the online court record of the McHenry County Circuit Court.

But a strange condition now exists. There is no attorney-of-record in the Court records for either estate.

Mark Gummerson, a Woodstock attorney, was in court on Tuesday., and he was also standing before Judge Sullivan when the motion by Schmitt & Filler to withdraw was heard. Judge Sullivan looked through the court jacket and said he did not find an Appearance (by Gummerson) in the jacket. I understood Gummerson to say that he had filed it. Perhaps he meant that he had stopped at the clerk's court before the 9:00AM court time and had filed it that morning.

When the Appearance hadn't shown up in online court records on Wednesday, I contacted the Clerk. And now, as of today, as of this time (see time-stamp), there is no Appearance on record to indicate the attorney for the executor of these two estates.

Why is an attorney important? Often, an independent executor will not know exactly what to do. He might attempt to follow the maxim that "it's easier to get forgiveness than to get permission." If there are some errors made, the executor may find out that Judge Sullivan is not very forgiving.

For example, when an estate has considerable debt, a judge will be very concerned that the creditors' rights are protected. Any cash assets of the Feldkamps now belong to the Estates. They do not belong to the heirs, of which there are two. The executor is a fiduciary. He cannot act in his own right or distribute any assets to an heir without court permission or until the estates are settled.

A lawyer who knows that his client is doing so might find that he's standing on a wobbly three-legged stool with a rope around his neck. A lawyer will absolutely protect his law license and his livelihood by instructing his client in the law.

Will a lawyer appear soon to protect the creditors of these two estates?

Feldkamp inquest - outrageous

This morning three inquests were conducted into deaths that occurred at the home of Jack and Audrey Feldkamp in Marengo. They were conducted in Rockford Public Safety Building, which houses the Office of the Winnebago County Coroner. Why Winnebago County? Why not McHenry County?
The Notification of the inquests provided the date, Friday, August 19, 2011, and the time, 9:00AM. When I received my Notice, after having indicated to McHenry County Marlene Lantz that I wished to attend, I immediately questioned why the inquests of Jack Feldkamp and Doran Bloom were being held in Rockford (in Winnebago County).

The answer was that it was for convenience. Since Audrey Feldkamp died in the hospital in Rockford, her inquest would be held there, and the McHenry County Coroner decided to hold her two inquests there, too.

At about 9:15AM Mr. and Mrs. Bloom, Sara Sutschek from the Northwest Herald, and I were led to the conference room where people were already waiting. No relatives of the Feldkamps were present. It turned out that the coroner's jury had convened at 7:00AM and had read the documents associated with the deaths. Two detectives were there from McHenry County, and a deputy coroner from McHenry County was there. And a court reporter.

A coroner's inquest is to be public, and I was astonished that the jury had been empaneled and had started its business out of public view. The instructions to the jury were not given in public, the swearing in of the foreman and the jury was done out of public view, and the jury had access to documents out of the public view. The two detectives may have been present to answer questions from jurors. If any questions were asks, they won't e on the record, because the court reporter didn't arrive until just before 9:00AM.

When the inquest formally started, Winnebago County Coroner Elizabeth "Sue" Fiduccia conducted the inquest for Audrey Bloom, reading a summary of the case and asking the jurors if they had reached a verdict. Clearly, they had already decided, because they did not expect to retire for deliberations. The McHenry County detectives who were present were not introduced. Det. Ed Maldonado was asked a question, but he was not sworn in. Perhaps he was sworn in earlier, when the jurors were meeting in private.

Afterwards, I challenged the procedures of the inquests with both the Winnebago County Coroner and the McHenry County Deputy Coroner.

All the jurors were from Winnebago County, where only one of the deaths occurred. It appears to me that the Illinois Statutes require residents from the county in which the death occurred.

"In all counties, in cases of apparent suicide, homicide, or accidental death or in other cases, within the discretion of the coroner, the coroner may summon 8 persons of lawful age from those persons drawn for petit jurors in the county."

This clearly indicates that the jurors are to come from McHenry County for the inquest into the deaths of Jack Feldkamp and Doran Bloom. However, no jury panel from McHenry County was present!

"Sec. 3‑3025. Verdict of jury. It shall be the duty of the jurors, as sworn aforesaid, to inquire how, in what manner, and by whom or what, the said dead body came to its death, and of all other facts of and concerning the same, together with all material circumstances in anywise related to or connected with the said death, and make up and sign a verdict, and deliver the same to the coroner. As part of its verdict, the jury may make recommendations other than for criminal prosecutions."

I had wondered why eight McHenry County jurors were going to inconvenienced by going to the Government Center and with what transportation they would be furnished. Well, I got the answer to that. They weren't!

Coroner Fiduccia said I was one of only a few people to question their way of doing inquests over the last 30 years. Maybe Winnebago County residents don't know or don't care. The old "ignorance and apathy" routine. Well, they should care.

Likewise, McHenry County residents should care. Residents should demand that inquests be conducted entirely in the public view, except for the deliberations to reach a verdict. And that the State law be followed. The only people who would have been inconvenienced would have been the two detectives from McHenry County Sheriff's Department. And really only one of them needed to be there. He didn't need a "minder".

There was at least one erroneous statement that occurred in Coroner Fiduccia's summary of Audrey Feldkamp's death. That had to come from a deputy's report or a detective's report from the McHenry County Sheriff's Department.

And that's enough to make me wonder about any other erroneous statements or conclusions.

Inquests scheduled in Rockford!

Today I received notification that the inquests for Jack and Audrey Feldkamp and Doran Bloom will be conducted in Rockford, not in McHenry County, where all of them lived and where two of the deaths occurred.

The reason? According to the McHenry County Coroner's Office, they are "combining resources" with Winnebago County. They do that occasionally, I was told, although the person with whom I spoke said he didn't recall a time when McHenry County had gone to Winnebago County for an inquest.

Jack Feldkamp and Doran Bloom died in McHenry County. Audrey Feldkamp was transported to a hospital in Rockford (Winnebago County), where she succumbed to her injuries.

The inquests will start at 9:00AM on Friday, August 19, and continue until all three, plus possibly an unrelated fourth, have been completed. They will be conducted at the office of the Wiunnebago County Coroner, Public Safety Building, 420 West State Street, First Floor, Rockford.

Feldkamp used 9mm handgun

How in the world did Northwest Herald editor Chris Krug find out so fast that Scott Feldkamp used a "9mm handgun" to shoot and kill Doran Bloom as he attacked his parents and him in the Feldkamp's Marengo home?

Was that information released at the sheriff's press conference, from which the sheriff excluded the Woodstock Advocate and the McHenry County Blog (although he did admit a reporter from the Lake in the Hills Patch)? Or did the information about the weapon just happen to get to editor Krug some other way?

Notice how no one has said whose gun was used. Was it Jack Feldkamp's? Was it Audrey Feldkamp's? Was it Scott Feldkamp's? If it was Scott's, how did it happen to be in Illinois, rather than in his Florida home?

Who of the household had FOID cards? Jack Feldkamp? Audrey Feldkamp? Not Scott Feldkamp - that's for sure, since he is a Florida resident. If he has a Florida concealed carry permit, it's not valid in Illinois.

When will residents (voters!) demand that the Illinois State Legislature (both houses) stop prohibiting law-abiding residents (citizens) from possessing and carrying guns? And when will the Federal government (Senators and Representatives in the House) grow up and create one standard rule of reciprocity, so that a person who carries legally in one state can carry in any other?

Having 50 sets of gun laws to know and follow would be like having non-standard traffic signals across the country. We are accustomed to seeing red on top; green on the bottom. What if some states put green back on top (as Nebraska did at one time)? Or allowed motorcyclists to treat a red light like a stop sign (which Illinois is considering)?

But back to my point - how did the Northwest Herald learn that Scott Feldkamp shot Doran Bloom with a 9mm handgun?