Citizen first, cop second

Why is it important to elect a sheriff of McHenry County who is a Citizen First, Cop Second?

A small matter ($5,300) tells voters exactly the kind of sheriff McHenry County has had for the past 13 years.

On July 13, 2008, a deputy started a U-turn off the shoulder of U.S. 12 outside Richmond and struck the right side of a passing car. A simple matter; right? Just pay for the damage and be done with it.

Instead, the crash report was falsified and placed the blame on the woman driver, not on the deputy. At the time a number of deputies were upset about this, and they haven't forgotten it.

The crash was not investigated by an outside agency. A MCSD sergeant, who was the supervisor of the deputy driver who caused the crash, wrote the crash report. The driver's attempts to reach that sergeant were unsuccessful.

Moving up the food chain at MCSD, the driver had no success. Even the then-undersheriff, Gene Lowery, refused to have the crash report corrected. Sheriff Keith Nygren refused to answer communications from the driver. The County Administrator refused to intervene.

The County's insurance claims administrator refused to pay the woman's claim, because the crash report indicated she was at fault as the driver of Unit 1. Well, if she was at fault, how come she didn't get a ticket? Why didn't the County ask her to pay for the damage to the deputy's squad car?

Because she was NOT at fault!

But stone-walling worked. The woman eventually gave up. I urged her to sue the Sheriff's Department, but the $151 filing fee was a hurdle. I suggested she ask the court to waive the filing fee, but she decided not to buck the system further.

If I am elected Sheriff on Nov. 2, this will not happen again.

If a deputy causes a crash, MCSD will pay. Without a fight. Without a delay. Oh, yes; and the deputy will get a ticket.

Claim denied due to falsified report

I've written several times about Lisa Jarva, a McHenry County resident whose car was hit by a deputy last summer and who has not yet been paid for the damage to her car.

The accident occurred on July 13, 2008.
The crash was investigated by a sheriff's sergeant - not by an outside police agency, which is usually the case.
The initial crash report listed the deputy at fault.
The deputy screamed.
The sergeant changed the report and put the woman at fault.
The falsified report was delivered to the woman and she was told the report was wrong.
The County's 3rd party claims administrator refuses to pay the claim, based on the falsified report.
The Sheriff's Department refuses to correct the report.
The Sheriff does not respond to the woman's letter.

If those involved had any guts, the report would have been corrected the very next day. You bite the bullet. You fix it. You go on. The issue dies.

I've heard from many deputies who are incensed over the handling of that crash report.

Should it be necessary for Lisa Jarva to get a lawyer and sue the County? Her claim should have been paid in August. Now it's the end of March and she still hasn't been paid. Not even close.

If the Sheriff's Department covers up a claim for $5,600 in vehicle damage and stonewalls a County resident with silence, what will it take to shake things up?

As with many things, there is a lot more to the story, such as why the deputy had stopped a motorist there in the first place. And why there were three other squad cars stopped on the shoulder there. And why they had stopped the particular cars they did. And how close they were to an event near Richmond where liquor had been sold all day, without a permit and without arrests for illegal liquor sales.