Chirikos stolen sign - was the "fix" in?

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Photo: FirstElectricNewspaper.com

There is more to the story about the stolen campaign sign belonging to County Board District 1 candidate Nick Chirikos. If I had high blood pressure, I'd sure need the meds after reading the detective's report, which I received this week in response to a FOIA request.

I now have the report of the investigating detective, Deputy Travis McDonald.
Remember what happened? On October 17 Deputy Smith arrested Steve Weber for stealing a campaign sign. Weber works for a sign company that was advertising the Dist. 1 campaign of incumbent Bob Bless. While Deputy Smith was transporting Weber to the McHenry County Jail, Smith got a phone call and was told to take Weber to investigations, where he would give a statement and be released.

Hello? On TV they would call this "The fix is in." Who pulled what strings???

Weber was not processed and booked in the Jail. Although he was arrested, he was apparently not finger-printed or photographed. He never had to post a bond. No record appears in McHenry County Circuit Court records for that arrest.

Det. McDonald's report says that while he was in roll call, Sgt. Cisner notified him that Dep. Smith was bringing Weber in. Dep. Smith took Weber to an investigations interview room and, when ordered, he uncuffed him.

Smith (remember, now; he is the suspect in a theft) told Det. McDonald that he didn't do anything wrong. (Gee, that's probably the first time McDonald ever heard a suspect say he was innocent. Right?) Weber told Det. McDonald that he was just being a good guy and was trying to find the person who lost the sign that he had found on the previous day and had put in his car. (I'll have to remember that "reason".)

Det. McDonald says that Steve "voluntarily provided a written statement". WAIT. Don't go away! And don't forget that Deputy Smith was told - while transporting Weber to the Jail - that Weber was going to give a voluntary written statement and then be released. The decision to release him was made before McDonald ever laid eyes on Weber!

Det. McDonald's report continues that Weber told him during the ride back to his car that "he had contacted his employer, who was going to make a phone call to the sheriff in an attempt to explain 'what was really going on'. The entire car ride to his vehicle, he proclaimed his innocence and told me that his employer's attorney, Mark Gummerson, had explained to the sheriff what had happened."

It takes about 30 minutes to drive from the 15.7 miles from 1075 W. Algonquin Rd., Algonquin, to the Jail. Weber is really lucky that he got hold of his boss, who got hold of Gummerson, who got hold of Nygren, who got hold of Cisner, who got hold of McDonald. Was there anyone else in the loop? Did I miss anyone? Did Nygren tell Zinke to "handle" it? There is still a chain-of-command at MCSD, isn't there?

Does this smell like a dead skunk to anyone else?