Libertyville man faces hate crime charge for ICE poster

A Libertyville man is facing a hate crime charge after authorities said he posted a sign with a bullseye and the words “Good Shot ICE,” the Lake County State’s Attorney’s Office said Tuesday.

Derek M. Webb was charged with the felony count and a misdemeanor count of disorderly conduct “for allegedly making direct threats against Latino and immigrant members of our community,” prosecutors said. It is the second such incident in Lake County in recent days.

On April 6, officers were dispatched to a business in Gurnee for a report of the sign being posted without permission, according to a State’s Attorney’s Office news release.

At a detention hearing Wednesday, prosecutors argued that the defendant poses a real and present threat to the community, as well as to the employees at the business. They argued that the defendant is deliberately posting threatening signs to businesses and posting them without permission, making the employees concerned for their safety.

Prosecutors emphasized that some of the businesses are employers of Hispanic or international staff, and that the staff felt alarmed and disturbed by the signs.

The judge granted the prosecution’s petition to detain the defendant. Webb’s next court date is scheduled for July 21 at 1:30 p.m. for a preliminary hearing.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, otherwise known as ICE, was widely criticized earlier this year for its heavy-handed and sometimes violent tactics across the country, including for its role in the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis.

“Clear threats of physical violence that are motivated by hatred, bias, or racism must be strongly condemned in the community and responded to by the legal system,” State’s Attorney Eric Rinehart said. “True threats are not protected by free speech, and they are particularly dangerous when they are directed towards groups who are historically and wrongfully attacked.”

He said police have collected evidence in the case “across dozens of scenes.”

“Finally, I’d like to express my gratitude to the brave members of the community who came forward to stand against this hate,” Rinehart said. “Like all of us, these members of the community hope for a brighter future in which hate is forever extinguished from our community. Hate must have no home in Lake County.”

In a similar situation, officials in Waukegan said this week they were alerted to a poster on a telephone pole that depicted Mayor Sam Cunningham, who is African-American, as an apelike creature.

The poster and another saying “MAGA” were found Sunday evening near Franklin and Hickory streets.

“Seeing yourself depicted through a painful, historic racial image is upsetting,” Cunningham said Tuesday. “It is one of the oldest and most hateful racist acts in the country’s history. Combined with hateful attacks on immigrants, these anonymous acts of intimidation are a cowardly attempt to spread fear, division, and prejudice.”

Waukegan police said there have been similar incidents reported since April, and that the investigation into them is ongoing.