• Boy’s pool stolen from his backyard

• Bullrunners speed by Springfield

• Police reopen 2002 death case

• Pit bull mauls second grader

• Child scalding leads to mother’s arrest

• ‘A dark cloud’ over police

• Human cargo

• The Century Club - 100 mph drivers explain why they do it

• Homeless man dies in tragic fire

• Jena Schuch: ‘She always had a smile’

• Prostitution in the capital city

• Cabdriver’s throat slashed

• Double-murder/suicide in Carlinville

• Body found in refrigerator

• Van’s IGA destroyed by fire

Part of my job as police reporter for the SJ-R is to thumb through media copies of police reports each day, looking for serious and unusual crime. In July 2006 I found a theft report where the stolen item was a backyard swimming pool. I did a little investigating and learned the victim was a 9-year-old boy who’d saved up his money for months to buy that pool for him and his siblings to play in.

The story ran on a Saturday. I checked my work messages from home that morning, hoping that someone in town would want to help Marcus Fearson out by finding him a new pool. There were dozens of messages by day’s end. One man went to the store promptly at 9 a.m. and brought a brand new pool for Marcus and had already dropped it off.

The police, by the way, nabbed the thief three days later.

Nine months of saving thwarted / Thieves steal pool from 9-year-old
July 15, 2006

Nine-year-old Marcus Fearson saved his allowance for months to buy himself something special.

At first he had his eye on a video game system but, after talking it over with his mom, decided a swimming pool would be just the ticket - a little indulgence to help him, his brothers and his cousins wile away steamy summer afternoons.

So on July 3, Marcus and his mother, Tiffany Fearson, went to Kmart and bought a $120 metal-frame pool. It was [...] Read the rest of this entry »

I was at lunch with fellow reporter Sarah Antonacci one afternoon in July 2006, when we started noticing a few cars with numbers on them speeding south on Interstate 55. We saw more of them whizz by and began hearing unusual animated state police chatter on the scanner. Then we realized most of the numbered cars were luxury sports cars.

We pulled over at the Taco Bell on Toronto Road after finding a Lotus parked in the lot. The driver came out of the restaurant and talked to me about what was going on. Turns out it was a cross-country rally for the rich and famous known as “Bullrun.”

Passing through / Rally routes rich and famous down I-55
July 25, 2006

Joe Talbot’s customized metallic blue Lotus looked a little out of place parked in the lot of Taco Bell on Toronto Road Monday afternoon.

After all, there aren’t many Lotuses in these parts. Same goes for Lamborghinis, Porsches and the multitude of other sports cars cruising down Interstate 55 Monday - a few of which reportedly were going faster than 100 mph, sometimes on the shoulders, and had state troopers scrambling to track them down.

Talbot’s was among the dozens of high-end luxury cars that raced through the Springfield area on Monday’s leg of Bullrun 2006, an invitation-only coast-to-coast rally that attracts the rich, the famous and a cast of “petrosexuals” - people obsessed with cars and motor sports.

Entry fees for the [...] Read the rest of this entry »

Of all the unsolved murders in the area, this is the one I most wish police would solve. I think part of what bothers me about this case is that there doesn’t seem to be anyone fighting on Julia Testa’s behalf, rattle the police department’s cage or pounding the pavement themselves in an effort to find her killer.

No one even ran an obituary in the newspaper for her. I have no idea what she looked like, who her family is or what she did in life.

The case remains unsolved.

Police reopen ‘02 death case / Initial investigation into woman’s probable homicide stalled
July 17, 2006

Springfield police have reopened their investigation into the 2002 death of a woman whose remains were found in her bed at a group home on MacArthur Boulevard.

Julia M. Testa, 39, was found Aug. 29, 2002, inside her room at 702 S. MacArthur Blvd. after a mental health worker went to check on her because she had missed several appointments.

While police investigated Testa’s death as a possible homicide after receiving autopsy results, the probe stalled for some reason.

Testa’s autopsy report shows she died of a stab-cutting wound on the front of her neck “and possibly additional blunt-force trauma.” The wound was to her larynx, not the veins or arteries of her neck, a detective testified at the coroner’s inquest Oct. 2, 2002.

However, evidence that typically would point to homicide was not present in Testa’s apartment.

The door to her top-floor apartment was locked from the inside with a [...] Read the rest of this entry »

After learning that a Springfield girl had been mauled by a pit bull, SJ-R photographer Justin Fowler and I set out to find the girl and learn more about how the girl was doing and what happened. We found 8-year-old Leticia Starks at her home with her mother. Starks’ ear was visibly injured, and she was visibly out of sorts from the traumatic incident.

‘Traumatized’ / Stitches alone may not heal girl attacked by pit bull
May 11, 2006

Eight-year-old Leticia Starks is a shadow of her usually rambunctious self.

That’s to be expected, her mother said, considering the trauma the second-grader suffered Tuesday night when a pit bull attacked her, mauling both ears, her right arm and her upper back.

“It’s not good. I have to look at my baby and see the pain that she’s in,” said Mondai Myers. “To be honest, I wish it was me who was mauled. I’d trade places with her in a minute. My baby is very traumatized.”

Doctors stitched up the wounds, and Leticia is taking pain medication. She returned home early Wednesday after spending several hours at Memorial Medical Center.

Myers said she’s unsure when Leticia will return to her class at Matheny Elementary School. She’s also unsure if the girl’s badly mauled right ear can be rebuilt, or if the attack damaged her hearing.

What is certain is that her little girl is alive and the pit bull is dead.

No one has stepped forward to claim [...] Read the rest of this entry »

I was a relatively new mom when this story unfolded, and it had a profound effect on me. My son was almost the same age as the tiny victim in this incident, and I could not imagine ever harming my son’s little body. I remember going to the ladies room and crying in the middle of the reporting process — both out of sympathy for the boy and anger toward the mother.

Child abuse prevention is an issue that became more important to me the more I reported on abuse cases, especially after I had children of my own.

Toddler scalded; mother arrested / Boy allegedly put in hot water after soiling his diaper
April 1, 2006

A Springfield woman was jailed Friday after she allegedly punished her 15-month-old son by scalding him in the bathtub with hot water, causing second- and first-degree burns, police and prosecutors said.

The burns were severe enough that some of the baby’s damaged skin fell off when he was lifted out of the bathtub by a witness, police said.

Brea N. Reese, 20, of the 1700 block of East Clay Street is charged with one count of aggravated battery to a child. Reese also goes by the alias Sherika M. Smith, according to jail officials.

The boy is being treated in the burn unit at Memorial Medical Center for deep second-degree burns on his feet, legs and bottom and first-degree burns on his lower back. Police said the injuries are not believed to be life-threatening, though he is expected to [...] Read the rest of this entry »

Fellow SJ-R reporter Sarah Antonacci and I worked together on this piece about problems within the Springfield Police Department’s Major Case Unit and more specifically with former detectives Paul Carpenter and Jim Graham, whose methods had been called into question by local attorneys, a judge and a fellow detective.

This award-winning piece brought together all the issues with Major Case and helped readers understand what was at stake.

Detectives said to be loose with procedures / Allegations against Major Case Unit detail numerous investigation violations
Jan. 22, 2006

Allegations against the Springfield Police Department’s now-disbanded Major Case Unit apparently revolve around suspicions that unit detectives violated department procedures and legal requirements in connection with search warrants, suspect interviews and court testimony.

In one case, a panel of federal appellate judges said they believed detectives had not told the truth when testifying against an alleged drug dealer. Their actions, the judges said in a written opinion, cast “a dark cloud” over the conduct of all police officers.

Illinois State Police investigators for months have been looking into allegations against the unit, as well as reviewing some of its investigations and the unit’s policies.

The state police probe originally was expected to lead to, if anything, internal departmental discipline of any officers found to have acted improperly. However, sources inside and outside the Springfield Police Department now say the investigation could culminate in criminal charges against some city officers.

The Major Case Unit was disbanded as of Jan. 1 by Police Chief Don Kliment. Kliment said the move was [...] Read the rest of this entry »

Interstate 55 is a pipeline for many things, including smuggled illegal immigrants.

In monitoring jail booking sheets and federal court filings in 2005, I began to realize state troopers conducting traffic stops along the interstate near Springfield were finding a startling number of illegal aliens traveling in appalling conditions. Affidavits accompanying the federal charges told the stories.

Human cargo / Smugglers use I-55 as pipeline to Chicago for illegal immigrants
Nov. 13, 2005

Picture this.

A Chevrolet Suburban hits the highway with 17 people piled inside. Most of the seats have been removed to allow more people to be crammed in.

No one is wearing seat belts, and the passengers - mostly Mexican citizens - are forced to squat below window level so no other motorists can see them.

The driver refuses to stop for bathroom breaks, so passengers must urinate in milk jugs or plastic windshield-fluid containers. If their bodily needs are any worse than that, they’re out of luck.

There might be one stop for food during the 1,800-mile smuggling trip, depending on the driver’s mood. He will remain at the wheel from Phoenix to the passengers’ destinations without napping. If he finally gets sleepy enough, he might ask another passenger to drive for a while. Neither has a valid driver’s license, nor does either have much of a grasp of the English language.

Think it’s a scene from the American Southwest? Think again. Illegal aliens are being smuggled through central Illinois every day, and [...] Read the rest of this entry »

This was one of my favorite research projects at the newspaper.

Robert Pope, a former managing editor at The State Journal-Register, read an article someplace about people who drive faster than 100 mph. He wanted to find out if there were locals who’d done it and ask them why.

The trick was finding them. I looked through circuit court records, but speeding tickets aren’t documented according to speed. One day I was on a ride-alone with a traffic deputy for the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office, and the subject came up. He explained to me under what traffic law a 100-mph ticket would be issued (speeding 40+ mph over the limit). Now I had a starting point.

The folks at the Sangamon County circuit clerk’s office were kind enough to give me a workspace in their office, and I started combing through the ticket files. I made notes on a yellow legal pad as I went along. Voila! I had a story.

From there I tracked down locals who’d been ticketed for driving more than 100 mph, and the result was a unique story about the so-called “Century Club.”

Century club / Since 2003, 124 motorists in Sangamon County have been ticketed for driving more than 100 mph
Aug. 1, 2005

Jason Shephard doesn’t have a pilot’s license. But, man, can he fly.

Shephard, 21, drives a silver 1997 Chevrolet Corvette he’s had since April 2004.

He didn’t really set out to buy a Corvette, a car [...] Read the rest of this entry »

In 2005 I wrote about Eddie Hanson, a local homeless man who died in a fire. He and another homeless man were inside a vacant house on the city’s north end looking for food. Eddie lit a fire so they could see. The fire got out of control, and Eddie was overcome and died. The other man escaped.

Authorities seek fire victim’s family / Identified as 41-year-old homeless man
June 9, 2005

Authorities need help finding the family of a homeless man who died Tuesday night when fire tore through the abandoned house in which he’d been squatting.

People who knew him said Edward R. Hanson, 41, worked day- labor jobs but did not talk about his family, according to Sangamon County Coroner Susan Boone.

Officials have determined that he was born in Hawaii and are contacting people in that state with the same last name.

One Web-based people finder shows 126 people in Hawaii with the last name of Hanson, while another shows more than 200.

“It’s only right and proper (that we try to find his family),” Boone said following Wednesday morning’s autopsy, which showed Hanson died of smoke inhalation and burns.

“We are going to pursue as much as we can. It’s almost like looking for a needle in a haystack with that many people by that name in Hawaii. Where do you start? We’re going to try, and anybody here who knows anything about his family, it would be helpful.”

Hanson’s body was [...] Read the rest of this entry »

Jena Schuch’s death at first was though to be an accident. That’s what her boyfriend told police. He claimed she mishandled a .12-gauge shotgun and killed herself. After a two-month investigation, Springfield police arrested Schuch’s boyfriend for murder.

Schuch, a 28-year-old mother of two, had only been living in Springfield for six months. I talked to her mom and friends to find out more about her and what her life in Springfield and back home in Michigan had been like.

‘She always had a smile’ / Boyfriend charged with Springfield woman’s murder
Nov. 9, 2003

Jena Schuch came to Springfield in March hoping for a fresh start.

Eight months later, family and friends are mourning her death, shocked that her boyfriend, Phillip Peterson, is in Sangamon County jail charged with murdering the 28-year-old woman on Sept. 13.

Peterson has maintained Schuch’s death was an accident caused when she mishandled a shotgun inside the garage apartment they shared in the 1800 block of South Wirt Street. However, those who knew her said Schuch was a skilled hunter who learned how to handle a gun properly when she was 12 years old.

“I would really like to see him face to face and say, ‘Look me in the eye and tell me what happened.’ There’s just a part of me that wants to do that so bad,” said Schuch’s mother Sue Gustafson. “I have a lot of questions the more I stop and think about things. My mind keeps saying why would you do that? There is no [...] Read the rest of this entry »

This piece is based on my first police ride-along on a prostitution detail. What an eye-opener it was.

Police use new approach to root out prostitution / Often-ignored problem fought with stings, outreach
June 15, 2003

He had a proposition for the pony-tailed woman in jean shorts and a T-shirt who’d been standing on the corner of Eighth and Enterprise streets Tuesday night.

He could drum up work for her if she agreed to give him $10 from every trick.

“What if I only make $10?” she asked, making eye contact with men who drove slowly past, several of whom circled back.

He’d let her keep it, he said, boasting that he’s good to all his girls.

A customer pulled up to the corner then, and she jumped in his car, promising she’d return in 30 minutes with $10 for him.

The alleged pimp - a 24-year-old man wearing a hockey-style jersey - strolled to a picnic table in the park nearby, lit a cigarette and waited.

Little did he know, the woman wasn’t a hooker at all. She was a decoy working undercover on a prostitution sting with a team of Springfield police officers. Her “customer” actually was another undercover officer.

Police, armed with two-way radios and binoculars, had watched the conversation take place. While the decoy and her “customer” waited a few blocks away, officers broke out law books to look up definitions for pimping and pandering. Pimping arrests are rare, they said, and they wanted to make sure this one held up.

Thirty minutes later, the woman [...] Read the rest of this entry »

Richard Cartwright was tougher than I would have been in the same situation. Of course, I’ve discovered over the years that most cabdrivers are, indeed, a tough breed. A robber slashed Cartwright’s throat with a serrated steak knife during a struggle, leaving a large scar.

I was able to track down and speak with Cartwright after the incident. The result was this piece:

Cabdriver recovering from stab wounds / Throat slashed during struggle with robber
Thursday, March 28, 2002

Driving a cab can be dangerous, and Richard Cartwright has the wounds to prove it.

Cartwright, 40, was robbed and slashed across the throat with a serrated steak knife about 4:30 a.m. last Thursday.

The veteran cabdriver now has numerous stitches on the left side of his neck and on his right hand. Though he has returned to work, he finds himself coping with a new wariness of the people to whom he gives rides each night.

“It’s scary. I get real edgy,” said Cartwright, who works for Lincoln Yellow Cab, often pulling a 12-hour shift from 7 p.m. until 7 a.m. “I’m just real shook up. It’s going to take a while to get over it.”

The ordeal began when Cartwright was dispatched to Denny’s, 2599 Wabash Ave., to pick up a man who allegedly could not speak English. A woman who works at the restaurant called the cab company on the man’s behalf, saying he needed to go to Glenwood and South Grand avenues.

The man got into [...] Read the rest of this entry »

This is one of the first major crime stories I wrote. I will never forget seeing from Interstate 55 the black smoke curling into the sky from the home George Setzekorn set on fire 10 minutes after the school bus dropped off his 14-year-old daughter there.

3 die in Carlinville / Double murder, suicide suspected; house set afire
Wednesday, April 24, 2002

CARLINVILLE - George Setzekorn wanted his ex-wife back and resented her parents for allowing her to live with them, authorities said, speculating that is what prompted the man to set the couple’s house on fire, shoot and kill his ex-sister-in-law and then kill himself with the same gun Tuesday afternoon.

Dead are Setzekorn, 53, of Centralia, who also goes by the name George Young; his former sister-in-law, Janie Goesmann, 45; and a third person found in the basement of the burning home of Neal and Margaret House. That body was believed to be that of Setzekorn’s 14-year-old daughter, Skylar Young.

Skylar was seen getting off the school bus at the House residence about 10 minutes before the fire was reported.

Setzekorn’s ex-wife, Patricia Young, was not injured. The parents of Goesmann and Young, Neal, 78, and Margaret, 74, House were treated for smoke inhalation and released.

The Houses were taken to Carlinville Area Hospital, where they were treated for smoke inhalation. Stone said Goesmann’s husband and three children were not home at the time of the shooting.

The ordeal began at 3:38 p.m., when [...] Read the rest of this entry »

The story of Paulleen Godoy, a homeless prostitute with no family locally, will always stick with me.

Paulleen was murdered and her body stashed in a nonfunctioning refrigerator on the city’s near west side in August 2002. It took local authorities weeks to track down her next of kin, a grandmother who lived in Washington state and could not come to Springfield to retrieve Godoy’s ashes or pay for a funeral.

Through Paulleen’s story I met a local woman named Margaret Best, a somewhat eccentric person who often took pity on those who live on the fringe of society. Margie quietly offered to pay for the funeral expenses to give Paulleen a proper funeral and burial. I went to the funeral, where several of Paulleen’s friends and acquaintances — prostitutes, homeless people and social service workers — showed up to pay their respects. There were flowers, a minister and a burial services for Paulleen’s ashes, thanks to Margie.

Margie lived alone, never married and had no children. She stepped forward an untold number of times with similar offers of money to pay for a funeral or at least make sure a lonely person had flowers at their funeral.

Margie died on Jan. 22, 2009. There were more people at Paulleen’s funeral than there were at Margie’s. I think she would have wanted it that way.

These are the stories I wrote about Paulleen’s murder:

Body found in refrigerator / Call brings police to garage on West Washington Street
Monday, Aug. 19, 2002

A badly decomposed body was [...] Read the rest of this entry »

I was working the night shift Aug. 23, 2001, and was on my way to a meeting in Enos Park when I heard some police scanner traffic about a fire on South Grand. Something about the tone of the dispatcher’s voice prompted me to head to South Grand to see what was going on.

As I got closer to South Grand, I began to see black smoke in the sky. By the time I parked and walked toward the Van’s IGA, a longtime neighborhood grocery store, large flames were shooting from the windows and firefighters were everywhere.

Photographer Kristen Schmid-Schurter and I stayed at the scene several hours and documented what was happening as firefighters battled the blaze. Store employees and neighbors could not believe what they were seeing.

Van’s IGA destroyed by fire / East side loses neighborhood grocery store
Friday, Aug. 24, 2001

Hundreds of Springfield residents watched in disbelief Thursday evening as a treasured neighborhood grocery store went up in flames.

Van’s IGA at 1230 South Grand Ave. E. was destroyed in the blaze, which began about 6:15 p.m. while eight to 10 employees and customers were inside.

All who were inside made it out of the building unhurt, but one Springfield firefighter was taken to St. John’s Hospital with minor injuries he suffered while battling the fire.

The fire apparently started in the back part of the roughly 20,000-square-foot building, according to Springfield Fire Department spokesman Greg Bestudik. Investigators were at the [...] Read the rest of this entry »