Three Macoupin County State’s Attorneys have opposed the release of an inmate initially sentenced to death in a 1985 murder.

The Illinois Prisoner Review Board is scheduled to hear a petition of executive clemency for 63 year old Robert G. Turner. Turner, formerly of Wilsonville, who was convicted for the rape and stabbing death of 16-year old Bridget Drobney of Downers Grove in July 1985.

In July 1985, three men used a flashing red light on their vehicle to pull Drobney’s car over and told her she had to go with them because she was speeding along a back road in rural Gillespie in southern Macoupin County. The case would later lead to a new state law sponsored by the late State Senator Vince DeMuzio making it illegal for the public to possess flashing red lights that impersonate police. Governor Jim Thompson signed the bill into law in July 1986.

Bridget Drobney’s body was found four days later in a corn field, twelve miles away from the initial encounter with the three men. Michael Turner confessed committing the crime to his sister, who in turn, reported it to police. The younger Turner cooperated with police and was given a 5 year sentence for concealment of a homicidal death; Hines got life without parole; and Robert Turner, who admitted to killing Bridget as she pleaded for her life, was sent to death row after being convicted by a jury of first-degree murder, aggravated kidnapping, aggravated criminal sexual assault, and criminal sexual assault. Former Governor George Ryan abolished the death penalty in Illinois in 2003, giving the older Turner a life sentence.

Current Macoupin County State’s Attorney Jordan Garrison along with former Macoupin County State’s Attorneys Ed Rees and Vince Moreth have filed documents on the motion opposing Turner’s release. All three attorneys recounted the heinous details of the crime, reverberations of which they say can still be felt in Macoupin County today.

The Illinois Prison Project filed the petition on Turner’s behalf back in June, but it was delayed after Drobney’s family complained that they had not received proper notice of any clemency hearing in the case.

Turner’s petition is now scheduled to be heard on January 10^th in a public hearing at the Sadie Forum in Chicago.

Routt Catholic High School Senior Julia Beeley has been named a semifinalist for the national 2023 Coca-Cola Scholars Program.

Beeley moves on to the next round of the selection process for a $20,000 college scholarship.

The Coca-Cola Scholars Program is the largest corporate-sponsored, achievement-based scholarship program in the U.S. 1,557 high schoolers from across the country were selected as semifinalists from a pool of over 91,000 submitted applications nationwide. The semifinalists were chosen based on academic excellence, leadership, and service demonstrated in school and community activities.

Semifinalists are now asked to complete Phase 2 applications, which include essays, a recommendation, and a transcript. An independent selection committee will review the applications and recommend 250 Regional Finalists by the end of January to take part in online interviews. 150 Coke Scholars will be named in March to receive a $20,000 college scholarship and attend Coca-Cola Scholars Weekend in Atlanta April 13-16, 2023, where they will be the guests of honor at the 35^th annual Coca-Cola Scholars Banquet and participate in the Coca-Cola Scholars Leadership Development Institute facilitated by program alumni. 

Julia is the daughter of Chad & Stacy Beeley of Jacksonville.

The University of Illinois-Chicago United Faculty members have authorized a strike. This is the third authorized strike in the U of I system this year.

Faculty have been working without a contract at the Chicago campus since August 16^th. The UIC strike authorization may not have an immediate bearing on anything happening at the University of Illinois-Springfield campus at the moment, but UIS United Faculty says its indicative of a greater problem.

UIS United Faculty President Dr. Kristi Barnwell says it’s creating an environment of more internal bickering than educating students and doing academic research: “It does signal to faculty, staff, and students here that the University of Illinois system has a habit of pressing its bargaining units to authorize a strike and go on strike. For UIS, we had our strike in 2016 and we authorized a strike vote this Spring, and in both cases, these were subsequent to strike votes and authorizations that took place at the UIC and UIUC campuses. So, what this signals to us is that after all these years, the University of Illinois system still doesn’t treat its faculty, staff, and students with respect when it comes to bargaining. While we don’t necessarily anticipate this having direct ramifications for UIS this go around, it does tell us that unless the University of Illinois gets serious, we will likely be voting to authorize a strike vote in 3 years when we are up to bargain again.”

Barnwell says that UIS students have been supportive of faculty strike votes in the past, and it has not created any animosity between faculty, staff, and students. You can hear more of Dr. Barnwell’s interview in the Audio Archive.

Public Relations at the UIS Campus said they did not have a comment on the UIC strike and referred inquiries to the UIC Public Affairs Office. A message left yesterday in the UIC Public Affairs Office has not been returned as of press time.

In a press release, UIC United Faculty accuse administration of being slow to negotiate or hear terms for faculty retention, competitive salaries, and clear cut family/work balance proposals. They say that the system has consistently pushed faculty to strike during labor negotiations for the last 15 years prior to coming to the table in good faith.

UIC United Faculty say the strike could take place as early as December.

Jacksonville Memorial Hospital has implemented temporary visitor restrictions to curb the spread of circulating respiratory illnesses.

The Illinois Department of Public Health has recommended the restrictions due to a statewide increase in respiratory illness including COVID-19, influenza and RSV. Memorial Health System has also implemented the restrictions at its five other hospitals.

The restrictions will not apply to outpatient Memorial Care locations, including urgent or primary care and laboratory or imaging appointments.

Memorial Health requires that hospital visits be limited to two visitors per patient at one time, and that all visitors be 18 years of age or older and show no signs of illness.

To help prevent the spread of respiratory illnesses, people should cover their mouth especially when coughing or sneezing; wash hands frequently; receive all recommended vaccinations; and wear a mask around others.

IDPH says that most people who contract a respiratory illness recover completely in one to two weeks, but some people develop serious and potentially life-threatening medical complications.

The Jacksonville City Council got their first look at the Jacksonville Community Revitalization report compiled by members of the city and the Illinois Housing Development Authority last Monday night

Christopher Walton of IDHA walked the city council through information pulled from the Community Needs Assessment Survey that the city distributed earlier this year. The final analysis compared Jacksonville to Edwardsville, Macomb, Ottawa, and Quincy to put the study into perspective compared to other municipalities of similar size.

Walton says that the city would qualify for many of IDHA’s grants and tax credit programs to help develop new housing opportunities in the city: “What I really want to touch on is the Low Income Housing Tax Credit known as LIHTC. This plan that was put together, you can used that for a 9% LIHTC application that helps developers have tax credits to be able to build affordable housing in the City of Jacksonville and bring more housing here.”

Directly after Walton’s presentation to the City Council last Monday night, Eric Hanson, legal counsel to the Morgan County Housing Authority, presented a site plan for two potential new developments of low-income housing along North Main Street.

Walton says they would likely use some of IDHA’s tax credit programs to get the developments built: “The Housing Authority’s not-for-profit entity that is its development arm has submitted a preliminary application to IDHA. IDHA just talked about one of the action items [in the report] is working closely with the Housing Development Authority seeking low-income housing tax credits, which would allow those types of housing to be developed. What we have handed out here in this proposal is very briefly kind of a site plan as well as some proposed elevations. Obviously, this is very, very preliminary, but where this is located is North Main Street that’s next to Downtown Commons. This is on the west side of the road heading north. What we would be proposing is there is some open space behind Downtown Commons that the Housing Authority already owns, there would be town homes there.”

The new homes would run from West Dunlap up to West Independence on North Main. There would also be a second development under the grant application that would have more town homes running along West Dunlap Avenue. The design would keep with similar town home designs along North Main Street.

The city is expected to act on adopting the Community Revitalization Plan at their next monthly meeting on November 28th. The Morgan County Housing Authority says it is still in preliminary stages of getting the idea of Downtown Villas off the ground with their tax credit application and will be returning to the city council once they have received more information on their application.

You may want to double-check that package of store-bought mushrooms before you put it in the holiday casserole.

The U.S. Food & Drug Administration have announced a recall by Green Day Produce, Inc.’s 7 oz. Packages of Enoki Mushrooms sold in September and October at stores nationwide.

The packages have potential of being contaminated with listeria, according to a press release.

The clear plastic package has the UPC code of 16430-69080, and is located on the back side of the package. There is no lot code or dates on the package.

No illnesses have been reported to date in connection with this problem. The distribution of the product has been suspended. The potential for contamination was discovered after a retail sample was collected and analyzed by the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development.

Consumers who have purchased the product are urged to return them to the place of purchase for a full refund. Consumers with questions may contact the company at (323) 587-4688 or william@greendayinc.com.

One Routt Catholic High School cheerleader will be spending the Thanksgiving holiday in the City of Brotherly Love.

Sophomore Jocelyn English will be representing Varsity Spirit, the global leader in cheerleading, dance team and band apparel, camps and competitions, and a division of Varsity Brands, in the 102nd Annual Philadelphia Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Cheerleaders and dancers who are invited to perform in the Philadelphia Thanksgiving Day Parade are part of a select group of All-Americans identified at Varsity Spirit summer camps across the country. Routt attended an National Cheerleaders Association camp over the summer where Jocelyn was selected as an All-American. Only the top 12% of the cheerleaders and dancers from Varsity Spirit camps earn the chance to participate in this high-caliber performance.

You can stream the parade online by downloading the 6abc app on 6abc.com or find it on Hulu. The parade begins at 7:30am (8:30AM EST) local time on Thursday.

The Jacksonville Area Museum is needing more volunteers to help with the MacMurray College archives.

Museum manager McKenna Servis says that parts of the archive are well kept while others were hastily put together during the college’s closure: “I only have two hands, so a lot more hands would be super helpful. Where I’m at with the collection kind of depends on the part of the archive that we are looking at. MacMurray College did have their own archivist. The archive was well taken care of. Some chunks of the archive are good to go. They are preserved the best they can be. The archivist did a really good job with it. Then, the school closed and lots of things were added to the archive unofficially. Faculty and staff just left things they thought were important.”

Servis says that she is still sifting through the latter half of the archive trying to figure out where everything belongs and doing the best to preserve everything for the long term.

Currently, MacMurray Hall houses displays from when the college opened to 1975. Servis says putting together the school’s latter history is a bit problematic: “A big problem that we faced, both the museum and the MacMurray Foundation, is just trying to find the history from 1975 on. There is lots of history through the 1990s and early 2000s, but with the college closing so abruptly, there really isn’t that late, more recent history. We don’t have it yet…2019-2020. It’s just not there.”

Servis says she just needs anyone who is interested in helping organize the museum to volunteer for a few hours each week: “There is no requirement to be a volunteer. You don’t have to have experience doing this before. We would need help moving boxes. We will need help just putting photos in photo sleeves. We’ll need help writing labels on folders, printing and putting labels on boxes. If you do come and volunteer, you will never be doing that alone. Myself or a board member will always be there with you to answer questions, so it’s definitely no pressure. You don’t need any expertise to come join us and help. You definitely don’t have to be a MacMurray graduate or a former faculty member or anything like that, but if you are, that would give me another opportunity to add to that history especially if you are recent faculty member or graduate.”

If you would like to volunteer, contact McKenna Servis at the Jacksonville Area Museum by calling (217) 408-1197 or email info@jacksonvilleareamuseum.org. The museum is located at 301 East State Street at the site of the old Jacksonville Post Office.

The City of Carrollton officially dedicated its new water tower on November 4th.

The original water tower was built for the city in 1924. The steel-riveted water towers were commonplace for small town water service in the middle of the 20th Century. According to the Greene Prairie Press, the original water tower was built by Chicago Bridge & Iron Works at a cost in 1924 for a little over $9,800. H.J. Caldwell Engineering Company in Jacksonville officially provided oversight of construction of the original tower.

The city broke ground for the new, $1.7 million tower on September 10th of last year. The land was purchased by the city from the Meek Family along Illinois Route 108 just west of town. The new 250,000 gallon tank was purchased through a Public Water Supply low-interest loan partially funded by the U.S. EPA and administered by the Illinois EPA. The low-interest loan has a period of 20 years.

The new water tower has been operating since early October.

The Village of Chapin announced Friday afternoon that their Chief of Police has graduated from a very prestigious program at Northwestern University.

Police Chief Steven Helmich successfully completed the Northwestern’s ten-week Staff and Command program held in Schaumburg from September 12^th through November 18^th. This program, which was implemented by the Center for Public Safety in 1983, has graduated over 30,000 students both nationally and internationally. Helmich’s class consisted of representatives from 40 officers from across the state. Helmich was the only downstate representative in his class.

The School of Police Staff and Command provides upper-level college instruction in a total of 27 core blocks of instruction that include topics Leadership, Human Resources, Employee Relations, Organizational Behavior, Applied Statistics, Planning and Policy Development, Budgeting, and Resource Allocation.

Helmich said in a press release that he was thankful to the Illinois National Guard for giving him the opportunity to attend the class through its retirement transition program. Because of the program, Helmich says he was able to attend at no cost to the Village of Chapin. Helmich also personally thanked South Jacksonville Police Chief Eric Hansell for providing a professional mentorship over the last several months.

The Center for Public Safety was established at Northwestern University in 1936 with the specific goal of expanding university-based education and training for the law enforcement community.

Chapin Village Board President Rex Brockhouse says that Helmich’s dedication and graduation from the program on Friday speaks to his dedication to the profession as he is still recovering from injuries he sustained in a shooting earlier this year. Brockhouse says he’s excited what Helmich will bring back to the Chapin Police Department from the program.