July became excruciatingly hot for LaSalle County State Attorney Brian Towne, after a formal complaint was filed against him and a letter was publicly posted accusing him of creating his own police force.
On July 27, a formal complaint alleging a violation of the Campaign Disclosure Act against Citizens for Towne was filed with the Illinois State Board of Elections by John Kraft of Paris, co-founder of the Edgar County Watchdogs (ECW) organization, alleging that the Democrat's political committee improperly reported campaign donations.
“When we have prosecutors that don’t follow the law, but manipulate it to suit their agenda, our society is in real trouble," ECW said in a statement. "It’s time for the public to know the whole truth as to what is really happening behind the closed doors of the LaSalle County State’s Attorney Brian Towne."
Specifically, Towne’s committee treasurer allegedly did not keep a detailed, exact account of each person who made a contribution and for how much. Also, per the law, the political committee allegedly did not disclose specific information regarding the people who collected or accepted contributions from at least five others in the aggregate of $3,000 or more “outside the presence of a candidate or not in connection with a fundraising event sanctioned or coordinated by the political committee during a reporting period,” Kraft’s complaint said.
The complaint also lists several examples that detail how Towne’s political committee allegedly failed to properly report such campaign contributions. For instance, the committee reported that in 2007 and 2014, individual contributions were made in the amount of $500 and $400, amounts that are “clearly over $150 and, according to court records and Towne’s response to (another) complaint, are made up of donations from others,” Kraft’s complaint said.
“It deeply disturbs me that one would suggest that my desire to seek justice for victims is based upon financial contributions to my campaign,” Towne wrote in a June 9, 2015 letter to the Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission in Springfield. The letter is submitted as an exhibit in Kraft’s complaint.
At the same time, local attorney Julie Ajster wrote a letter that has been published online by ECW, alleging that during her own investigation, Ajster learned some things about Towne’s State’s Attorney Felony Enforcement unit, known as the SAFE unit.
“Few know or understand SAFE," Ajster's letter said. "As an attorney in LaSalle County for over 13 years, I had not heard of SAFE until April 2015. Since then, I have spent hundreds of hours gathering thousands of SAFE documents. I am sharing what I have learned about SAFE with you,” the letter said. “In 2011, Towne created his own police force and called it SAFE. It was a completely independent and a one-of-a-kind law enforcement unit. SAFE was not a task force or a special unit of the LaSalle County Sheriff’s Department or any other law enforcement agency in LaSalle County.”
Ajster also said in the letter that Illinois statute 55 ILCS 5/3-9005(b) allows a state’s attorney to appoint a “special investigator” to “serve subpoenas, summonses, make return of process, and conduct investigations which assist the state’s attorney in the performance of his (her) duties.” Ajster said Towne interpreted the statute to say he could have his own police force, and he used this statute as the authority to create SAFE.
Towne’s SAFE officers were labeled “special investigators,” but Ajster also said in her letter that they were actually drug enforcement officers because their duties were to “identify, investigate and seek prosecution of all violations of the Cannabis Control Act and the Controlled Substance Act, and any other drug-related crimes,” the unit’s policies and procedures said.
In June 2015, the Third District Appellate Court ruled that Towne’s SAFE officers were not “special investigators,” as allowed by Illinois law 55ILCS 5/3-9005(b) and that his SAFE unit was not permitted under state law.
“It is the duty of law enforcement officers to investigate violations of the law," Ajster wrote. "It is the duty of the state’s attorney to prosecute violations of the law."
The case is now pending before the Illinois Supreme Court, and experts have said the case could significantly redefine and expand the power of Illinois prosecutors if Towne wins.
In written arguments submitted to the state supreme court, Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan’s office -- which is representing Towne and the SAFE unit in the appeal of the lower court’s ruling – said it was OK for the “investigators” with Towne’s SAFE unit to make drug-trafficking traffic stops along Interstate 80 because the officers were making citizens' arrests.
Dissenters of that opinion argue that while Illinois law allows for a state’s attorney to have investigators on staff to assist police in certain instances, it does not permit them to instigate traffic stops looking for drug traffickers or people transporting large amounts of cash.
Towne, who has been the state’s attorney in LaSalle County since 2006, for the first time will run in a contested race in a re-election bid this November.
Towne's Republican opponents, candidates Karen Donnelly and Betty Roliardi, both have lamented the “citizen's arrest” defense being used by Madigan’s office in an effort to persuade the state’s high court that Towne’s SAFE unit is allowable under Illinois law.
The Illinois Supreme Court convenes next on Sept. 12, then again Nov. 14.
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