McHenry County Blog

If you are interested in Dave Bachmann’s take on what another Deputy that McHenry County Sheriff Keith Nygren fired said in the deposition that he gave in Zane Seipler’s Federal wrongful termination suit, another installment has been posted on Dirty Keith vs. Dirty Harry.

Bachmann continues telling what Deputy Scott Milliman told him the night of Nygren’s re-election in 2010.

Included are two visits to U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald and his rejection by the FBI in Rockford, where Fitzgerald sent him after their visit.

This is Part 2 of former Deputy Sheriff Zane Seipler’s lawyer Blake Horwitz’ request for sanctions against Sheriff Keith Nygren.

This motion was filed in response to a request for sanctions against Seipler by Nygren attorney James Sotos in Seipler’s Federal wrongful termination case.

Most of the post consists of direct quotes from the Seipler motion for sanctions.

“Plaintiff asks that his Court entertain a dispositive disposition in connection with this motion in the form of default and/or the striking of affirmative defenses,” the introduction of the filing reads.

Circumstances of the three instances of Defendants’ alleged violation of the Court’s Protective Order are then discussed. (Paragraphing and formatting has been added to make the text easier to read on a computer screen.)

“Milliman Transcript

“The Defendants submitted confidential and/or sensitive materials to third parties. Scott Milliman testified that Sheriff Nygren and Jose Rivera committed serious crimes, as this Court may remember. The transcript was tendered to

• non-party civilian Jose Rivera,
• Sgt. Ellis and
• Undersheriff Zinke (Exhibit A) and
• a reporter for the Northwest Herald.

“In the Herald’s expose, a scathing editorial was drafted, comparing Scott Milliman to a Sesame Street character (Exhibit B). The Herald’s attack is now available for all to see since December of 2010.

“A quick review of the article demonstrates its chilling effect on any other officer who could and/or would testify in this matter.

“Five officers have come forward and testified, under oath, that they were fearful of testifying in this cause due to the repercussions of testifying against Sheriff Nygren [Foot Note 1].

= = = = =
Foot Note 1 – “Deputies Gerald Bodden, Cynthia Matteson, Timothy Matteson, Scott Milliman and Jill Tutt. Scott Milliman was terrified during his deposition. He was afraid that he too was going to be killed for his testimony. His eyes watered and had difficulty answering certain questions. If Defendants contradict this representation, Plaintiff’s counsel shall order the transcripts and demonstrate same to the Court. Plaintiff seeks to limit public dissemination of this information due to the fear these officers experienced in the depositions.”
= = = = =

“Their fears were justified.

“The transcript was tendered to three nonparties and the Northwest Herald. Milliman was fired for his comments.

“Further, there can be no justification for tendering a transcript concerning alleged criminal activity to a purported coconspirator in crime (Jose Rivera). This is particularly true and obvious as applied to a Sheriff’s Department. To be clear, the Court’s Confidentiality Order required non-dissemination:

“’Confidential Matter [includes] … information that is of a sensitive or non public-public nature regarding …. Defendants, non party witnesses…’ (Exhibit C). This Court now has direct evidence of a willful disregard for this Court’s authority. The affidavits (Exhibit A) speak for themselves…

“Blake Horwitz certifies that he received the Milliman transcript on January 20, 2011, via e-mail and did not disseminate the transcript to anyone. Jensen Court reporters, via Laura Davis, state that the transcript was tendered to Defense Counsel on December 7, 2010.

“Circumstantial evidence demonstrates that Defendants tendered the transcript to the Northwest Herald. Just as it published a scathing review of Deputy Milliman, the Herald is a weekly mouthpiece for the Sheriff, espousing his point of view on a variety matters, including this litigation.”

= = = = =

More tomorrow.

The Northwest Herald doesn’t make the connection on the exclusive story that McHenry County Sheriff Keith Nygren handed them.

Eighteen percent of the last 100 visits to McHenry County Blog ended up in an article about Kurt Milliman’s running for County Board in the 2008 Republican Party primary election. Milliman lost badly in the race in which Nick Provenzano and Mary Donner tied in winning with almost twice as many votes as Milliman and Jim Schlader.

The Northwest Herald’s research also reports Milliman lost a close race for Prairie Grove Village President the next spring.

The Daily Herald, putting up a story over three hours after the NW Herald, reported Kim Smith being arrested for “two counts of obstructing justice, disorderly conduct and prostitution.”

Her husband Tim was charged with the murder, as well as “aggravated discharge of a firearm, pimping and pandering.”

They lived in unincorporated McHenry County on Doty Road, right down from Centegra’s Woodstock Hospital.

Both Smiths are incarcerated at the McHenry County Jail.

Gus Philpott has information about prior arrests for the Smiths.

Depositions in former Deputy Sheriff Zane Seipler’s wrongful termination suit are on-going. Scott Milliman is one of the people to be interviewed again.

For those interested in articles about Deputy Scott Milliman’s, you can find them below:

Transcript in Last Zane Seipler Wrongful Termination Court Hearing – Part 1

Transcript in Last Zane Seipler Wrongful Termination Court Hearing – Part 2

Transcript in Last Zane Seipler Wrongful Termination Court Hearing – Part 3

Transcript in Last Zane Seipler Wrongful Termination Court Hearing – Part 4

Where’[s the Beef?

Transcript in Last Zane Seipler Wrongful Termination Court Hearing – Part 5

Transcript in Last Zane Seipler Wrongful Termination Court Hearing – Part 6

Rockford McHenry County Sheriff’s Department Revelations Move to Woodstock Courthouse in Call for Special Prosecutor

Is this “The Beef?”

Northwest Herald Reports Nygren Cleared by FBI

Zane Seipler’s Attorney Seeks Sanctions for Release of Deputy Scott Milliman’s Deposition to Northwest Herald & Expenses Resulting from Late Release of Ticket Data

McHenry County Blog sat though the Rockford hearing before Magistrate P. Michael Mahoney a week ago on December 15, 2010. While I took notes, I thought it best to wait until I could obtain a copy of the transcript of the day before publishing anything.

The underlying case is one in which former McHenry County Deputy Sheriff Zane Seipler, who ran unsuccessfully against Sheriff Keith Nygren in the spring GOP primary election, sued the department for wrongful termination. Racial profiling has been a centerpiece of the case.

The first part of the transcript follows:

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
WESTERN DIVISION
ZANE SEIPLER, ) Docket No. 08 C 50257
)
Plaintiff, ) Rockford, Illinois
) Wednesday, December 15, 2010
v. ) 2:45 o’clock p.m.
)
CAPTAIN ANTON CUNDIFF, et )
al., )
)
Defendants. )
TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS
BEFORE THE HONORABLE P. MICHAEL MAHONEY
APPEARANCES:

For the Plaintiff: THE BLAKE HORWITZ LAW FIRM, LTD.
(20 S. Clark Street, Suite 500, Chicago, IL 60603) by
MR. BLAKE WOLFE HORWITZ

For the Defendants: JAMES G. SOTOS & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
(550 E. Devon, Suite 150, Itasca, IL 60143) by
MR. JAMES G. SOTOS

Court Reporter: Mary T. Lindbloom
211 South Court Street, Rockford, Illinois 61101
(815) 987-4486

(The following is from a tape recording of proceedings:)

THE COURT: All right. 08 C 50257, Seipler v. Cundiff.

Good afternoon, counsels.

MR. HORWITZ: Good afternoon, Judge.

MR. SOTOS: Good afternoon, your Honor. Jim Sotos for the defendants.

MR. HORWITZ: Blake Horwitz for the plaintiff.

THE COURT: All right, counsels. I’ve got a lot of material here. Why don’t you just start off with tell me where  you think everything’s at at this point in time. Three minutes, though. Tell me where you think you’re at.

MR. HORWITZ: With regards to the status of discovery?

THE COURT: Status of discovery, where you think the case is going, what order you want me to take these motions on, anything you want to talk about. This should be just Merry Christmas to you.

MR. HORWITZ: Three minutes. Is it like a lawyer’s — is it a lawyer’s three minutes, or are we talking –

THE COURT: Well, you’ve already used up 15 seconds.  See, that’s always a mistake.

MR. HORWITZ: All right. So, generally speaking, we are prepared to be, I would say, close or at the end of discovery as of today. And as you read in the motion, which there’s an issue about it being under seal, which we need to  address. So, that’s question mark number one.

Where Deputy Milliman came forward and articulated that there was a long line of criminal activity that Sheriff Nygren was involved in. Some of the criminal activity would be 404(b) evidence. Other criminal activity would be 608 evidence.

Targeted criminal activity concerns the conduct of Sheriff Nygren and a gentleman by the name of Jose Rivera, which has an established — have established connection with the two of them.

In fact, they’ve recently gone on a meeting over in federal court, believe it or not, with Judge Barasa (phonetic), within the last week. So, they have a tight connection, the three of them — the two of them, excuse me — Jose Rivera and Sheriff Nygren and the criminal activity that they were engaged in.

One was to bring Hispanics undocumented over to McHenry County, actually to a particular apartment complex called the Stonelake apartment complex. That apartment complex is a place where officers engage in racial profiling. The officers that engage in racial profiling, the evidence would be, are Bruketta and Jones, the officers that we’ve talked about.

THE COURT: Wait a minute. You mean they lived there or what?

MR. HORWITZ: No. Stonelake Apartments is a place where many, many, many Hispanics, if not mostly Hispanics, live.  I haven’t taken a poll. But my client actually lives very close to there, and the facts are that it’s a place where there’s a very high percentage of Hispanics that live there, a very, very high percentage.

THE COURT: What’s this got to do with Bruketta?

MR. HORWITZ: Bruketta and Jones, especially Jones, there’s evidence that those officers actually stopped their vehicle at that location where the Stonelake Apartments are with the intention of developing a high number of arrests, which they benefit from, high number of arrests, and the arrests that they seek to undertake are those with regard to Hispanics. So, that’s racial profiling.

THE COURT: And they benefit because they advance as far as the Sheriff’s Department –

MR. HORWITZ: Yes.

THE COURT: — is concerned or they get priority as far as picking vacation days or something like that?

MR. HORWITZ: Officer Bruketta, for example, he was on the department I believe for a year or a little bit less than a  year, and his promotion was — and his self articulated promotion, meaning in his deposition said by being active performing arrests, generating lots of tickets, etc., I became a K-9 officer. That is a promotion at the department. So, each officer, though he’s not a sergeant, which we wouldn’t actually consider — I wouldn’t actually consider to be a promotion –

THE COURT: How does that come in? Your case that you’ve got pending here claims that your client’s First Amendment rights were violated because he complained publicly, which is what he’d have to, about racial profiling and got fired because of that, right?

MR. HORWITZ: Yes. He went to the Illinois State Police, FBI, the EEOC, his supervisors, etc., yes.

THE COURT: All right. Then he gets at least retaliated against. Okay?

MR. HORWITZ: Job demotions and termination.

THE COURT: That’s right. Now, now you’re sliding over and talking about this illegal activity. Now, the only way I can think that you can even try to connect this up with your lawsuit is to say what? One of the reasons the sheriff was so sensitive about this issue was because of this alleged illegal conduct, and so that’s why he fired your guy? In other words, counsel –

MR. HORWITZ: That is one of the bases.

THE COURT: Well, how does it fit into your lawsuit at this point? Your guy has a relatively straightforward lawsuit.

He says, “I saw racial profiling. I thought it was wrong. I complained about it. I went outside. I broke the code. And because of that, I was trampled on,” right?

MR. HORWITZ: Yes.

More tomorrow.