Arbitrator tried to keep TRooper Hearing From the Public
The workers' compensation hearing for a former Illinois State Trooper was changed. People following this case were
amazed! Why? Well this state trooper Matt Mitchell had plead guilty to reckless homicide after he was involved in a accident that killed 18-year-old Jessica Uhl and 13-year-old Kelli Uhl of Collinsville on Nov. 23, 2007. Authorities said he was driving at 126 mph, talking on his cell phone and e-mailing when the accident happened. That is why!
Now Bnd.com has obtained (Freedom of Info Act) copies of the emails. Read below and you can put the story together. Then I hope you get mad.
A state workers' compensation arbitrator who will decide whether former Illinois State Trooper Matt Mitchell should be compensated for his injuries wanted to keep the public hearing secret, according to e-mails between the arbitrator, Mitchell's lawyer and an assistant attorney general, who represents taxpayers.
"We are going to do it on the sly with no press," wrote Illinois Workers' Compensation Commission arbitrator Jennifer Teague in an e-mail to her court reporter. Thousands of Teague's e-mails were obtained by the Belleville News-Democrat under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act.
Ann Spillane, chief of staff for Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, said, "It is completely unacceptable for there to be any discussion to minimize press coverage or to thwart the public's effort to attend a public hearing."
Teague, of Shiloh, did not respond to e-mail and voicemail requests for comment.
Workmen's comp hearings are supposed to be open to the public. Mitchell's hearing originally was scheduled for Dec. 20 in Belleville hearing site, but was pushed up to Dec. 17 and relocated to Collinsville office without public notification.
"There is nothing I can do to keep them (News-Democrat reporters) out of a public hearing, but will be more than willing to do a special setting and an unknown place and time!" Teague wrote to Mitchell's lawyer, Kerry O'Sullivan, on Oct. 18.
O'Sullivan, in a November reply to Teague with a copy to Assistant Attorney General Bill Schneider, suggested an "off-docket trial of this matter to prevent or reduce media attention."
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