PERRY CO.—Once again, we ask: Remember Keith Kellerman?
Sheriff Keith Kellerman
The Perry County sheriff who got caught with a man in another county conducting himself indecently, was charged under local ordinance, got a big bad defense attorney who basically iterated that Kellerman was above the law then, miraculously, all charges were dismissed and under a secret court hearing not conducted in the public eye?
Well, he’s announced he’s running for sheriff again.
Yes, we know, you’re saying “You’ve got to be f*&king kidding me” right now. We said it too.
This ridiculousness is what makes so many people become jaded to the election process. And the law enforcement system. And the judicial/court system. Because there is no reason anyone should vote for this man. He was charged but received preferential treatment. His preferential treatment extended to the conducting of legal proceedings in secret chambers. No FOIA response was ever honored. Why? Because the judiciary isn’t subject to FOIA…thus reinforcing the belief that we are all just peons, and those with a government-supported paycheck are above any and all laws.
J. Ian Stennett, from a fundraising page for Special Olympics. See, he’s actually redeeming himself.
We don’t care who Kellerman prefers as regards his sex partners. We don’t care what bars he frequents in his free time. We only care that an elected sheriff was proven to be above the law, and that’s WRONG. His work over the last 16 years hasn’t been THAT exceptional. There are still people hanging out there who were allegedly involved in the Sidnee Stephens murder case but who remain either uncharged or unconvicted after three years. Any of his other “accomplishments” he’s listed cannot be attributed solely and directly to him, but came about as the result of work with other agencies, in particular the Illinois State Police, whose District 13 is located in his county (DuQuoin). It’s typical pre-election blustering that most candidates give. However, in Kellerman’s case, he’s not just any candidate. He’s the one who proved to the public that if you’re in a position of authority, you have a get out of jail free card. You and your sex partner, by the way.
And if voters in Perry County need any other reason to send Kellerman packing during the Primary (there are two Republican candidates running on that ballot, but Democrat Dennis Cole has also announced that he is challenging Kellerman on that party’s ticket), it’s that at the end of a fifth term—20 years in office—the citizens of Perry County will then be supporting Kellerman to his dying days, since he’ll be able to retire on the taxpayers’ dime.
This is one of those situations where the taxpayers can finally start showing those “in charge” that THE TAXPAYERS are ultimately the ones “in charge.” Public office isn’t a reason to “forgive and forget” someone’s behavior any more than it’s a reason for a judge to dismiss it all in secret as if it never happened to begin with. Our country needs to get back to not worrying about whose kids are going to see their parents’ names in print, and start showing these kids that people need to be held accountable for their actions, and that public servants should be held to a higher standard of accountability. Those same public servants, after all, are the ones who cite, arrest, and charge the rest of us with crimes that they say we should be accountable for…why should they be looked upon as any different?