La Salle County crime is up by one-third, SAFE-T Act procedure inflating stats

Fernando Martinez is scheduled for trial next month in connection with a November break-in during which shots were fired. If a jury convicts him of home invasion, he faces up to 50 years.

While being held in the La Salle County Jail, the 21-year-old Ottawa man was charged with burglary (three to seven years) in connection with a break-in a month before the home invasion.

The case is an example that has padded La Salle County’s crime statistics.

A year ago, the circuit clerk’s office would have reopened Martinez’s home invasion case and filed the burglary as a new count. That was before the SAFE-T Act. Under the new rules, Martinez received a brand-new case number – distinct from the home invasion case – which in turn makes the county’s felony total look worse than in previous years.

More than six months into 2024, La Salle County is on pace for a 29% increase in felonies. That sounds terrible – until one considers Martinez is among a growing number of felony suspects who created double or even triple entries in the current felony total.

Ottawa drug suspects Katie Fought and Jeffrey Delagarza were charged with felonies twice in 2024. So was Larry Kelly of La Salle, who is facing gun charges; Benjamin Sappington of Ottawa, charged with battery; Bruce Sirtoff of Ottawa, charged with a threat; and Richard Young, charged with ATM theft. They would have accounted for six felony cases under the old rules. Instead, they created more than a dozen new cases.

“You cannot add counts once the original case is filed,” La Salle County State’s Attorney Joe Navarro said. “So they go back out, get in more trouble and create a new case number.”

It’s happening with misdemeanors, too, which appear headed for a 16% increase this year. Navarro said that total also is deceptive and misleading, and can be blamed on the SAFE-T Act’s accounting.

Data from one local police department suggests crime is flat or even slightly down. The Peru Police Department said it forwarded 86 felony cases to Navarro’s office last year, while this year it is on pace for 79, which would be an 8% decrease.

Peru Police Chief Sarah Raymond said she was aware of the skewed effect the SAFE-T Act is having on countywide crime statistics and agreed: The 29% increase is way off the mark.

“It’s not here in Peru,” Raymond said. “We don’t see that type of increase here.”

The drug task force is experiencing an altogether different trend, however.

Marc Hoster, commander of the Tri-County Drug Enforcement Narcotics Team, said the task force made 78 drug arrests through June 30. By comparison, Tri-DENT made 79 arrests in all of 2023.

“We’re definitely way up,” Hoster said. “To say we’re going to be double this year? I can’t say that.”

No single factor is driving the upswing in drug cases, but Hoster believes drug dealers have been enabled by the SAFE-T Act. No longer do dealers fear being held on a high bond, if they’re even held at all, he said.

“I can tell you people are a lot more brazen than before,” Hoster said. “I’ve heard people make comments like, ‘They don’t send you to jail anymore.’

“I think it’s going to take a couple of years to sort all this out.”