Author: matthaiduk

Matt Haiduk is a criminal defense lawyer in Illinois. He loves his dog. And pizza.

That dude from Moonshiners doesn’t listen (to me, anyway).

Moonshiners Arrest.JPEG-005ce

I try to be helpful here.  I really do. I know I probably fail.  It’s not for lack of trying, though.

A while back I wrote these riveting tips on what to do once you’ve been arrested.  It was ground breaking stuff.  Earth shattering, even.  I thought lives would be saved.  It felt good to help.

You ever seen that show Moonshiners?  It’s about the brightest in American small businessmen trying to eek out a living in this brutal world.  It’s entertaining.  If you’ve ever seen it, you know some of those guys could use any help they can get.

It appears that one of the “best” of those bright, small businessmen just got arrested.  As you know, I’m not one to hold an arrest against somebody.  I am one to hold mistakes a man makes after arrest against him, though.

So, re-read those tips about what to do once you’ve been arrested.  Then, read this article on the Moonshiner guy who got arrested.  Then look at his mug shot.  Does he look like a guy who was illegally drinking in the Quickie Mart parking lot?   Maybe just a little bit.  What conclusion can we draw from all of this?

Clearly the guy can’t read.

 

Kane County and the red light cameras.

I don’t think I’ve ever posted anything here about red light cameras.  I probably don’t have to tell you what I think about them, though.  I don’t like them.

Apparently, I’m not alone.  There was an article in the Daily Herald this weekend regarding what may soon become the last of the Kane County’s red light cameras.  We can only hope, anyway.

According to the article,

…Kane County implemented a change in the law in the fall of 2010 that capped the life span of any red-light camera on the county highway system at three years.

Only two cameras have not run up against against the 3 year cap so far- both are in Geneva (and, coincidentally, just south of the courthouse on Randall Road).  The interesting part of the article isn’t necessarily that the permits for the cameras could only span three years.  It’s the idea that you can re-apply to put cameras in (or put them up elsewhere), and there’s been “a lot less interest” in doing so.

So, why do I hate these things?  Why do other people hate them?  Why aren’t cities and villages as interested in putting them up as they were 4 or 5 years ago?

I hate them for what they represent.  There is nothing anywhere, ever that represents the grotesque metamorphosis of the traffic code going from being genuinely safety motivated to being financially motivated.  I’m a big believer that when there’s financial incentive for the government in criminal courts, things get messed up.

In the interest of full disclosure, I was once forced to pay one of these violations after a guy who looked a lot like me, driving a car that looked a lot like mine, displaying a license plate exactly like mine failed (barely) to come to a complete stop on Route 64 just east of St. Charles.  I can tell you that the fines really aren’t that bad.  The whole system for these tickets is a little too slick, though.

Think about it- the city puts one in.  There is no officer on the street that has to patrol.  There is no time wasted by cops writing tickets or filling out red-light violation paperwork.   No cop has to waste his time actually seeing you roll over that line at 1 mph before making that right turn. If you’ve ever gotten one of these things, you know the ticket shows up in the mail from a seemingly private company, and your local cops didn’t even see the ticket.

There’s also no judge who will listen to your plea, or any added cost (to the government, of course) to make sure your pesky rights aren’t violated.  There’s not even a county clerk that has to “waste” her time taking your payment– you pay through the web site set up by that private company!  Just a piece of mail getting sent to you, and a check of yours getting sent back.

There are, no doubt, people out there that will argue that the cameras may make an intersection safer. And, if one person is saved, they’re worth it.  Whether or not they have any effect on traffic at a given intersection is hugely debatable, however.  Not to mention that if we’re willing to justify any intrusion on the basis that just one life may be saved… well, we could eliminate all traffic deaths by outlawing cars.

At least on this one the tide of public opinion (based on the fact that the cameras are disappearing) seems to jive with my opinion.  For once.

I might be here. I might be there. I might be hiding. You never know.

Greetings,

I know you’ve been wondering why I haven’t been posting much.  I’m sure it’s been keeping you up at night.  I’ll bet that some of you have been so worried that the stress is making it hard for you to function.  It’s horrible, I know.

To you, I offer my sincerest apologies.

It’s not that I haven’t been posting.  To be honest, I have a secret to tell.  I’ve been cheating on you.

It’s not your fault.  You’re great.  Seriously. You’re the best and I wouldn’t ever want you to change.  It’s just that I’ve been contributing to another web page and I didn’t think you were ready to hear about it.

Its name is Excessive Bail.  Excessive Bail is a fairly new deal.  It’s actually a collaboration among several criminal defense attorneys- so it’s not just my stuff.  It’s got some fun stuff, some serious stuff, and some stuff about Walmart hot dogs.  Over there, you can even comment and tell me how nuts I am.

But I still want to be friends with you.  So, I’ll still write stuff here- just not as often.  I’ll use this space for local stuff… like my hatred for certain local police departments or when we make the big-time news.  I’ll use Excessive Bail for the more general types of stuff… like making fun of new lawyers, or how listening to a pimp can help you in traffic court.

I’m sorry I had to break it to you like this.  Please don’t hate me.

Police… and Their Integrity.

Pretty interesting piece running over in the Daily Herald.  If you’re not aware, there was a very major bust of some suburban Chicago (not anywhere in Kane County, thankfully) undercover cops who had purportedly found a way to make a little “extra income” while on the job.  Apparently the McHenry City Police Department isn’t the only office with this sort of issue.  Pretty sad.  Especially considering the cops want you to believe they’e better than regular people.

The gist of the Daily Herald article is pretty simple:

But who bears the responsibility of ensuring that officers working undercover don’t cross the line between acting like a criminal and becoming one?

I’m not going to go on a long rant about this.  I do that enough about stuff I can’t change.  I’ve got an idea, though.

People have asked me why I don’t like the cops. I really don’t have a problem with that profession.  I have friends who are cops.  I respect a lot of cops.  I come across cops all the time that are decent people doing great work.

What I have a problem with is “Meatball Police Culture.”  It’s something that, I’m sure, they start to hear at the Police Training Institute.  That’s that cops are the “thin blue line” between good and evil.  Between “us” and “them.”  If it wasn’t for the thin blue line, all of “them” would take over and kill “us” (or vice versa depending on where you stand), right?  If you don’t support the thin blue line, you’re automatically one of “them.”

Dammit, line up and get your cute thin blue line products and support the men and women keeping “them” away from “us.”

The profession can’t embrace that attitude.  It only causes itself more problems.  Cops are people just like anyone else.  It’s not “us” against anybody or the cops collectively against anybody else.  It’s easy to not keep an eye on your own buddies when your attitude is that it’s you and your buddies against the world.  That’s what the Meatball Culture does.  It’s cops looking out for cops against both “us” and “them.”

I’ve got a case right now where, on video, an Illinois State Police Trooper stops a car for a tinted window.  When he walks up to the car, he’s got his hand on his gun.  The cop is visibly agitated, swears at my client, and yells several times as though he might pull his gun out.  I guess you might need to know what side that driver is on before you can be sure you don’t have to shoot him, right?

If cops were that skeptical towards each other, maybe the debacles at places like Schaumburg and McHenry wouldn’t happen.  If a large number of cops didn’t act as though they were a righteous tribe solely tasked with keeping “them” off of “us” perhaps they’d have more energy to police the police, and less energy to harass Star Trek fans.

Just a thought.

It’s so sad.

The subject of one of the most popular posts on here is in the news again.  Back in April you may recall that the McHenry City Police Department had an officer get charged with misconduct stemming from that officer’s purported theft from the department evidence lockup.  I was a bit cranky about the press release put out by the chief of that department:

The fact is that I feel bad for the whole situation.  The life Hojnacki knew is over- whether or not he’s guilty.  If he stole money or didn’t steal money, that’s sad.  The intensity of a criminal arrest for a cop is off-the-meter when compared to a non-cop.  It’s possible to be empathetic without condoning what somebody has done or is accused of doing.  It seems they don’t teach that in Police Chief school.

Well, it’s not a “purported” crime anymore.  According to the NW Herald Mr. Hojnacki has entered admissions to a couple of the charges, with sentencing to follow.  What does the Chief have to say about that?  Lots, I guess.  He’s not going to tell us yet, though:

“I want to speak, but there’s a gag order and I’m respecting that gag order,” he said.

I feel so sad for the Chief.  I’m sad that he has things he wants to say and he can’t.  That must be frustrating.

I’m also sad that he’s Chief of a department that seemingly had no real control over the integrity of its evidence.  I’m sad that it seems anybody could walk into his evidence vault and take whatever they wanted (“Hojnacki was not assigned to the evidence vault and was not an evidence custodian, McHenry Police Chief John Jones has said.”).  I’m sad that, in a moment of weakness, any officer in that department could have compromised the evidence and possibly effected a lot of criminal cases.  It saddens me to think that the blame in that office doesn’t seem to run all the way to the top.

Like I said in the original post, Hojnacki has made a mistake and it has cost him far more than it would a non-police officer.  What has allowing this to happen cost Jones?

Maybe if he hadn’t been bound by the gag order, Jones was going to come out and tell us how he messed up.  How all of this was allowed to happen.  How he’s completely changed the way they keep their evidence.  How anybody who wants to get into that evidence vault has to go through him, or somebody he trusts.  How he bought a mirror and he looked in that mirror and realized the guy in that mirror is no better than anybody else.

Maybe.

Probably not.