Regional Police Report: Paramedics Attacked By Bees and More
The following is a selection of police-related items reported in area Patches recently. Where arrests or charges are mentioned, it does not indicate a conviction.
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Des Plaines
Des Plaines firefighters and paramedics were swarmed by bees during a rescue near the Des Plaines River Wednesday.
Firefighters were helping a man with a serious leg injury along the river bank when a beehive was disturbed, officials said. The patient and emergency workers were stung.
Niles
Cop Accused Of Sex Assault To Be Reinstated
The Village of Niles has signed a legal agreement with police officer Fotis Markadas, who was accused of sexually assaulting a woman in Niles when he was off-duty in January 2010.
No criminal charges were brought in the case.
The village will reinstate Markadas as a police officer per the settlement agreement which Patch obtained Thursday under the Freedom of Information Act. Markadas has not been on the job in the two and a half years since the allegation.
An arbitrator ruled in April that the village had to pay Markadas 21 months of back pay and benefits; however, the village decided to appeal that ruling, and the agreement calls for paying Markadas just under 14 months' worth of back pay and benefits.
Woodstock
McHenry County Sheriff’s deputies are investigating multiple hay barn fires that have been occurring in rural McHenry County since May. The sheriff’s office is trying to determine the origin of six fires and is looking into possible criminal activity involving the fires, according to a release.
Barn fires have been reported in rural Woodstock, Marengo and Harvard, deputies said. Kane County and Boone County authorities have also reported fires within their borders, the release stated.
Lake Zurich
One-Year Anniversary In Hit-and-Run Death
It was one year ago on July 22 that a hit-and-run driver killed Gabby Drozdz, a Lake Zurich teen.
A Catholic memorial Mass was held at St. Francis De Sales Church and attended by close friends and family, on the one-year anniversary.
“It was very emotional,” said Gabby’s sister, Ilona Gregory, who gave a speech along with her brothers. Gabby was the youngest of five and would have been 19. “Part of my words were that on the one hand it seems like the longest year of our lives and, on the other hand, I can’t believe it’s a year already; it still feels so raw and new . . . My sister really did die. It seems like, did that really happen?”
Gabby was on her way to Alpine Fest, when a driver struck her and two friends on Church Street, July 22, 2011.
