Crime & Safety
State Cop Threatened Conservation Cop Who Gave Him a Ticket: Complaint
The state cop sent the conservation cop a threatening text message, the criminal complaint said.
JOLIET, IL — A sergeant with the state police sent a threatening text message to a state conservation police officer after he got a ticket, according to a criminal complaint filed in Will County court.
State Police Sgt. James Powell and Chicago Police Officer Brian Leahy were cited for allegedly hunting on private property in December 2015. The cases against Powell, 40, and Leahy, 39, were dismissed after the prosecution was unable to find witness Diane Cullinan Oberhelman in time to notify her of the upcoming trial, according to court records.
Powell and Leahy were charged with hunting on private property near the intersection of Interstate 80 and Interstate 55.
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The day after Powell and Leahy were ticketed, Powell sent Conservation Police Officer Nicholas Honiotes a text that said, “heard you wrote a sgt with the State Police and a cpd cop a ticket could be a hard lesson for u,” the complaint said.
Powell, a Monee resident, was arrested on a charge of electronic harassment on May 1. He was freed on $10,000 bond.
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Trooper DeAnn Falat, the spokeswoman for the District 5 state police, failed to respond to voicemail and email messages. Falat gave no answers when asked if Powell was suspended or placed on leave, or why it took nearly a year and a half for charges to be brought.
One year after Powell and Leahy were ticketed, the pair sued Honiotes, a conservation police deputy chief and captain, and four other officers, along with two forest preserve police officers, a Joliet cop, the City of Joliet, and the Forest Preserve District of Will County. The federal lawsuit alleges that all of the defendants “acted together to prevent Powell and Leahy from hunting on the property as retaliation for prior complaints Powell had made about Illinois Department of Conservation Police interfering with his hunting activities and/or to protect (two of their) perceived exclusive right to hunt on the Property.”
The lawsuit contends that the owner of the property gave Powell and Leahy permission to hunt deer on it.
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