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LAWRENCE CO.—A local theft case within the city of Bridgeport has turned up a response by Lawrence County authorities that may show where pressure is being applied from forces higher-up.
Other than the attorney general’s office, however, it’s not exactly clear where the pressure is coming from.
But it’s becoming readily apparent that someone or something is pulling the strings of those who are tasked with meting out justice in Lawrence County.
And that task seems to now be fraught with a bad case of “hot potato” as the prosecutor, the judge, and the defense attorney, along with everyone involved in the latest federal case to haunt the corrupt in Lawrence, is waiting to see who’s going to make the next move…or be the first among them to do something to resolve it.
Discovered theft of lottery tickets
The theft case came to light on the evening of Wednesday, June 17. At that time, Bridgeport Package owner James Brunson went to his store to reconcile the day’s take and found that there were lottery tickets missing…as well as cash.
Because the lottery is state operated, he immediately made calls and Illinois State Police responded and took a report.
The suspect was his most recent employee, Elizabeth Dorsie Willoughby, 20, of New Albany, Ind., who had come to work for Brunson after answering an ad for employment he’d placed out of the area about four months prior.
As a benefit of employment, Brunson would provide a place for Willoughby to live upon moving to the area (he is a landlord with many rental houses in three counties, but in this instance, he rented a room in his own home to her) and provide her with a vehicle to drive to and from his home in Lawrenceville to Bridgeport and back, a common practice for Brunson as he often has trouble with local hires and their lack of an automobile.
The biggest problem with this was that Willoughby, for whatever reason, had never obtained a driver’s license, but she proceeded to get a permit and was getting in her hours on the road with another licensed driver in the car.
On frequent occasions, that other licensed driver was Brunson’s niece, Kristen Schafer, 18.
Because Willoughby and Schafer were so close in age, they began to hang out together.
Goes to Sumner
It was Brunson’s sister Melissa Schafer who was his second call on the night of the 17th, as he was throwing Willoughby out of the house and the girl needed somewhere to go until someone in New Albany could come retrieve her.
However, instead of anyone in New Albany arriving, law enforcement in the form of an ISP trooper took Willoughby into custody the next day and, upon being interviewed, she admitted to checking in a UPS delivery of lottery tickets, activating them, then settling them all in the same day (this ostensibly on May 27, although there exists a record that she also took these steps on June 12).
According to official reports, she also admitted to taking a large sum of cash over a period of some months—nearly the entire time she was working in Bridgeport—that amounted to several thousand dollars in cash.
She was booked at the Lawrence County Jail on an arresting charge of theft greater than $300 but less than $10,000, and had a bond set at $5,000, which no one in New Albany was able—or willing—to post, this on the afternoon of the 18th.
Staff discovers incident report
On the afternoon of Friday, June 20, Disclosure staff, doing regular courthouse work, was at the Lawrence County courthouse at about 12:30 p.m. and went to speak with county prosecutor Chris Quick, who advised of the situation with Willoughby, indicating that formal paperwork had yet to be filed in the matter, as state police were still investigating the thefts.
Upon completion of file work at the circuit clerk’s office, the staffer noticed that Brunson’s own case was on the docket call for 1:30, and so opted to stay in the vicinity in an attempt to learn more about Willoughby…as well as observe the status of Brunson’s case.
Brunson was charged with a felony Aggravated Battery charge in 2010 after he discovered a highly inebriated Jody Harshman, a gofer for former mayor/now-federal convict Max Schauf, busting out the windows of his business with a hammer in the early morning hours of August 7 of that year, and defended himself against Harshman advancing on him with the hammer. Because Brunson had been experiencing a rash of vandalism at his store in the weeks prior, he was armed; and because in the scuffle the handgun discharged (but did not strike Harshman, despite Harshman declaring it had), then-prosecutor Lisa Wade charged Brunson with the serious felony.
On the afternoon of June 20, 2014, a hearing was being held on Brunson’s motion to dismiss that charge, the motion made based on the fact that Harshman, during 2013 depositions for Brunson’s federal civil case he filed in March 2012 against Wade, Schauf, and other individuals and entities, had revealed that he’d lied to investigators about being shot…and Wade had suppressed that evidence, taken by medical personnel in Mattoon, since day one.
The dismissal of the case was key to the federal case moving forward, as one of the complaints in it was False Arrest…and as long as the case was alive in Lawrence County Circuit Court, the arrest couldn’t be considered “false.” But if the case were dismissed on the merits of the argument that Wade deliberately didn’t turn over all evidence in discovery, that, indeed, made a good argument for a “false” arrest.
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Quick leaves; Shinkle arrives
The hearing was scheduled for 1:30. Quick, however, left the courthouse at about 1:15, explaining to Disclosure staff that Brunson’s attorney, Brian Shinkle, had called and advised that he wasn’t going to be able to make it for the hearing—not an unusual situation, as when Shinkle was state’s attorney in Edwards County (until 2008), Disclosure staff had observed his frequent absence in that courtroom…and ongoing frustration from Judge David Frankland because of it.
So it was with some great surprise when staff encountered Brunson and Shinkle in the courthouse at 1:26 p.m., headed for the courtroom.
They were advised that Quick had said “there was going to be no hearing,” and it was Shinkle’s turn to be surprised, as he’d advised Quick, via a phone call earlier, that he was running late and would be prepared to argue the motion at 2 p.m. instead of 1:30.
Judge Robert Hopkins was also surprised when he called the case at 2 p.m. and wondered aloud, at 2:05, where the prosecutor was.
Disclosure staff texted Quick and informed him of this situation that was developing in the courtroom at about 2:20.
His response was to say he’d call the judge and “see what he wants to do.”
It’s unclear whether that happened, but at 2:24 p.m., Hopkins announced that they were setting the case for another day, at which time Shinkle would present his brief on the motion to dismiss, and Quick—who had already advised the defense in previous months that he was NOT going to object to the dismissal—would accede to the motion, and the case would be over.
That date was set for a phone conference hearing at 11:30 on Tuesday, July 1 (release date for this issue.)
Trooper threatens Schafer with arrest
When they exited the courtroom, Disclosure staff told Shinkle and Brunson what had happened in the 15 minutes prior to their arrival in the courthouse as regards Quick…which revelation somewhat stunned them, as Shinkle advised that he had NOT called Quick to cancel the hearing.
Their decision was to wait and see what would occur in the week and a half interim.
But what occurred was the presence of the ISP trooper who was handling the Willoughby interviews and evidence showing up at Brunson’s store and advising him that his niece was now a suspect in the lottery ticket theft.
As it turned out, while Willoughby was confessing, she incriminated the young Schafer girl in her alleged thievery. The trooper had gone to the girl and had asked her some pointed questions, including whether or not she knew that the tickets had been stolen (to which Schafer had answered “Yes,” because she had been apprised of the situation by her mother and uncle after Willoughby’s arrest)…as well as had asked her about money that had been in a bag in her room, the bag being one of Willoughby’s that she’d had with her on the night she’d gone to stay with the Schafer’s.
As it turned out, Willoughby’s mother had called from Indiana after her daughter had been jailed, asking them to look for some money Willoughby had secreted in Kristen Schafer’s room, about $800, and asked them to put that money aside so when they arrived from New Albany, the family could use it to post bond.
Instead, the Schafers had immediately contacted police, advised them of the phone call, and turned the money over to them.
Further, the Schafers began to suspect that money that Willoughby had been turning over to Kristen “to put into her bank account because (Willoughby) couldn’t open a bank account locally” (no driver’s license, no ID) and hold for Willoughby in weeks prior to the discovery of the theft was probably stolen as well…and they told the trooper about that.
Because of this, the money on hand, and that the young Schafer had answered in the affirmative about knowing about the stolen lottery tickets (which the trooper took to mean that she knew in advance of the discovery that they were stolen, not after), the trooper was threatening Brunson and the Schafer family with the 18-year-old’s arrest.
More discoveries
On deadline, Disclosure called Quick and asked if there were any plans to charge Kristen Schafer with any of Willoughby’s doings.
Quick advised that it had not been his plan to do so, as Schafer seemed to be on the periphery of the whole thing and simply a by-product and something of yet another victim of Willoughby’s deception; however, he did mention that he had been out of town and hadn’t seen ISP’s reports on that aspect of the situation yet, so he couldn’t exactly make the call.
Disclosure then learned that someone had ‘made a call’—Elizabeth Willoughby had called her mother from the jail on the night she was incarcerated, and had been the one who’d asked her to secure the cash that was in Schafer’s room, hence the mother’s call to the Schafer residence.
Disclosure called the jail and attempted to determine if jail calls were recorded. Sheriff Russell Adams said that some were, but not collect calls—which was what Willoughby had placed to her mother.
Were those calls to have been recorded, it would likely have shown that Willoughby was allegedly attempting to set up Schafer with the money in her room…much as she had already done with the cash she wanted the girl to “hold” for her in her bank accounts.
Disclosure was unable to learn how much was in the accounts; as well as how Willoughby determined exactly which kinds of calls are or are not recorded from the jail.
Attorney general’s office repping Wade
But the situation became even more spurious when Disclosure learned through courthouse sources that Quick had received a call on Monday, June 23, from Jennifer Lutzke, Lisa Wade’s attorney in Brunson’s federal civil suit pending in Benton.
In December of 2013, Wade’s attorney—who is being paid for by the taxpayers of Illinois via the Attorney General’s office, who steps in when Constitutionally-mandated county officials are sued in any capacity, and remains her attorney despite Wade having been voted out of office—filed a motion for summary judgment against Brunson, which effectively would dismiss his case against the former prosecutor were it to be granted.
One of the claims in the motion for summary judgment was that “False Arrest” wasn’t applicable because Brunson was still under a charge of Aggravated Battery in Lawrence.
Had the motion to dismiss the charge that Shinkle had filed on February 28 been attended to at any one of the many court dates set to hear it (April 14, May 30, June 20), without Quick’s objection to it, the dismissal would already have taken place…and Wade’s motion for summary judgment would be moot.
As it stands right now, Lutzke has been successful in continuing the federal court dates to hear the motion for summary judgment…these continuances coming on the heels of every rescheduling of Brunson’s felony case in Lawrence County Circuit Court.
Quick reported that Lutzke seemed somewhat upset that there hadn’t been a decision made in Brunson’s case on June 20, and that there was a continuation to July 1.
Wade’s latest re-setting of the summary judgment motion was scheduled on press date for this issue, June 30, at 11 a.m. at the federal courthouse in East St. Louis.
The unknowns
So as of publication of this edition, there are many factors unresolved in the entire mess:
It’s unknown whether Kristen Schafer will be charged with Elizabeth Willoughby’s alleged thieving activities.
It’s unknown whether Wade will have her hearing in federal court, or whether it will again be reset on the docket pending outcome of the July 1 hearing.
It’s unknown what will happen at the July 1 phone conference; Hopkins, however, has a reputation for being meticulously thorough in his judicial decisions, and even if the case were to have been heard on July 1, it’s entirely possible Hopkins will “take the case under advisement” and that it could be another two months before he renders a decision, despite the fact that Quick has no objection to the dismissal.
And it’s unknown why this legal wrangling is continuing in a case that clearly should never have been charged from the beginning, and should likely have been dismissed at the very start: The preliminary hearing held in September of 2010, when it was alleged by the state (Wade) that Brunson shot Harshman, when in fact no such thing ever occurred.
Corruption
And it all may boil down to corruption on a level that was the basis for putting Schauf in prison for the multiple federal crimes he was convicted of last year. That’s because Wade seemed to have always been acting on Schauf’s word—which was no good—and upholding criminal conduct by public officials to the detriment of the populace of Lawrence County who paid her paycheck for four years…and who, along with the entire state, is now paying for her defense in a civil suit that would never have been filed if she had actually been doing her job.
What remains to be seen now is whether Quick is doing HIS job…or if the same string-pulling that was occurring in 2010 has reared its ugly head once again in Lawrence, to Brunson’s detriment as well as to that of his niece.
Developments between this issue and the next (on stands July 23, 2014) will be featured at disclosurenewsonline.com.
The offenses occurred on October 31, 2013, in Williamson County. Evidence at the plea hearing established that Gunn sold cocaine to a confidential source working for law enforcement. During an October 31, 2013, search warrant at Gunn’s Marion residence, agents located a Ruger, Super RedHawk, .44 caliber revolver, cocaine, digital scales, drug packaging materials, and U.S. currency. Upon arrest, Gunn admitted to ownership of the firearm and cocaine. At the plea hearing, Gunn’s bond was revoked and he was remanded to the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service, pending an October 30, 2014, sentencing hearing.
