Unlike our Cook County neighbors, “public corruption” are two words not bandied about often in Lake County. But it appears Waukegan is in the midst of an official scandal.
Dozens of Chicago aldermen and Cook County elected officials have been convicted of misconduct over the recent decades. The most recent being Ed Burke, the once-powerful Democratic city alderman and husband of a former Illinois Supreme Court justice.
The ongoing count also includes state lawmakers from the county to our south who have been indicted and convicted by federally empaneled juries. Into this time-honored Illinois tradition enters former Waukegan 4th Ward Ald. Roudell Kirkwood.
The latest development in his saga involves the office of record-keeper City Clerk Janet Kilkelly. On Dec. 13, Kilkelly handed over her city-issued cellphone to Ron Gardella, Waukegan’s information technology director, and Police Chief Edgar Navarro, who sought it on behalf of the Illinois State Police as part of the continuing probe.
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Citing probable cause, it was ISP Department of Criminal Investigations officers, led by Special Agent David Juergensen, who first entered City Hall with a Jan. 12 search warrant and demanded all sorts of public records regarding the former alderman and his company, Mac Dynasty Inc.
Kirkwood, who was defeated for renomination in the February Democratic primary election, is facing felony charges of official misconduct, forgery, wire fraud and theft by deception. In July 2022, the former embattled alderman was indicted by a Lake County grand jury alleging in a 31-count indictment he made false statements on documents, including those to Waukegan and the Illinois Liquor Control Commission.
According to the indictment issued by the Lake County state’s attorney’s office, on 26 occasions between 2019 and 2020, Kirkwood failed to make full disclosures either to state or city officials as required for lucrative video gaming machine and liquor licenses. He also didn’t divulge there were delinquent sales taxes on the business, the indictment said.
The probe into the ex-alderman’s business dealings began in 2019 after he submitted applications to the Illinois Gaming Board. That also was the year he was first elected to the Waukegan City Council.
Right after his election, he purchased a Waukegan restaurant near the intersection of Green Bay Road and Sunset Avenue. In his applications to the Gaming Board for six video gambling machines, Kirkwood said he owned the restaurant.
Yet, he allegedly failed to mention his son, Joshua — who had a federal criminal conviction — was a co-owner, according to the indictment. Kirkwood also didn’t disclose he was an elected public official, which was required, and didn’t acknowledge his aldermanic status on his liquor license applications, the indictment noted.
He might have forgotten his son was a felon, or he was an elected city official. Or, as authorities allege, he sought to subvert the system.
Armed with that search warrant approved by a Lake County judge, investigators nearly a year ago took files, papers and electronic forms from four city departments: Business licensing, the City Clerk’s Office, finance and IT. Also grabbed were tax ledgers and emails, along with liquor license files located in the basement of City Hall.
The realm of issuing local liquor licenses once was under the city’s business licensing department until the administration of former Mayor Sam Cunningham transferred that job to the City Clerk’s Office in 2017. Upon her election, Mayor Ann Taylor moved liquor licensing back to the business department in 2021.
As for her part, Kilkelly, who also is a nonpaid Waukegan Park District commissioner, says she’s been cooperating with the state probe into Kirkwood’s affairs. “Throughout this ongoing investigation process, the office of the city clerk, as well as City Clerk Janet E. Kilkelly, have been in complete compliance,” she said in a Dec. 29 statement.
A special prosecutor, Kane County State’s Attorney Jamie Mosser, is in charge of the Kirkwood case because before Lake County State’s Attorney Eric Rinehart was elected in 2020, he represented a member of the ex-alderman’s family. At the time of the criminal charges, Rinehart said he sought an outside prosecutor to avoid any appearance of a conflict of interest.
That being said, Waukegan residents deserve to know what sort of official misconduct in which Kirkwood allegedly was involved. At the same time, the former alderman should have his day in court sooner rather than later.
After all, there’s 13 months until the next city primary election in February 2025.
Charles Selle is a former News-Sun reporter, political editor and editor.
X @sellenews