Revenge Porn Joliet Police Lawsuit: JPD Depositions Underway

JOLIET, IL — Six members of the Joliet Police Department have given their pretrial depositions during the past month in Officer Cassie Socha's revenge porn lawsuit against her employer.

The following Joliet police officials appeared in front of the lawyers and answered questions surrounding the federal lawsuit, questions asked under oath:

• Detectives Jeff German and Don McKinney, April 28
• Lt. Chris Botzum, April 30
• Plaintiff Cassie Socha, May 4
• Current Deputy Chief Carlos Matlock, May 7
• Detective Brad McKeon, May 13

Joliet Police Department lawsuit depositions set for late in May and June:

• Current Deputy Chief Robert Brown, May 28
• Sgt. Tim Powers, June 1
• Detective Dave Jackson, June 2
• Officer Michael Devito, June 3
• Lt. Jeremy Harrison, June 8
• Phillip Bergner, former information technology employee with Joliet police, June 14
• Al Roechner, retired police chief, June 21
• Marc Reid, retired deputy chief June 22
• Darrell Gavin, retired deputy chief, June 24

Lawsuit depositions to be determined:

• Sgt. Edward Grizzle, the co-defendant in the lawsuit
• Current deputy chief Michael Batis
• Retired deputy chief Tab Jensen was originally set for May 12, but was rescheduled at Jensen's request.
• Detective Shawn Stachelski was set for May 27, but has been rescheduled at the plaintiff's request.

"Plaintiff expects that he will identify an 'informant' who approached him in/around July 2018 with information corroborating the allegations in plaintiff’s complaint. Once this 'informant' is identified, plaintiff will need the deposition of this 'informant,'" court records filed last week show.

Socha's lawyer and Tressler LLP, the Bolingbrook law firm representing the city of Joliet, previously told the federal judge that the Joliet police officer depositions could be done by June 30. However, the lawyers for Joliet recently indicated they may want to conduct up to 20 additional depositions themselves, and that could stretch the depositions until Sept. 15.

In August 2018, Socha filed her federal lawsuit accusing a number of upper-level Joliet police supervisors of engaging in a revenge porn scheme to embarrass and humiliate her by illegally seizing her private cell phone.

Last July, Joliet Patch reported that Socha and her lawyer, Hall Adams of Chicago, were seeking $950,000 from the city of Joliet to settle the lawsuit without going trial. However, the Joliet City Council did not agree to settle the case for that amount.

As a result, Socha and her lawyer are moving closer to taking the case to a federal jury trial. Socha and her lawyer contend that the Joliet police administration, in an act of revenge, obtained an illegal search warrant on May 18, 2018, to let them seize Socha's private iPhone.

In May 2018, Socha was called by a special prosecutor to testify at the criminal trial of her future husband, Joliet Police Officer Nick Crowley. The previous summer, Crowley and Socha got into an argument inside their Joliet townhouse and Crowley fired his gun through the ceiling.

But at Crowley's bench trial before Will County Judge Dan Kennedy, Socha's testimony was more helpful to Crowley than the Joliet police supervisors trying to convict him. Crowley was found not guilty of all the criminal charges, including reckless discharge of a gun.

And "although Grizzle and City were unable to find evidence of any criminal offense on plaintiff's iPhone, they succeeded in finding private images with which to embarrass and to humiliate plaintiff. Specifically, they found numerous private, still and or video-graphic images that clearly depict plaintiff while nude and/or while engaged in sex acts with Crowley, who is also clearly identifiable in these images," Adams argues in Socha's federal lawsuit.

The plaintiffs believe that several people who work at the Joliet Police Department were allowed to watch or make copies of the nude videos involving Socha for their personal viewing pleasure.