Teen drinking pictures on Web lead to charges for 5 people

Investigations prompted by online photos of underage drinking parties in the Lombard area have resulted in charges against five people and suspension of 11 student-athletes.

DuPage County sheriff's officials on Friday announced 34-year-old Jessica G. Holz was charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor.

She's accused of hosting a Jan. 5 party at her home at 21W238 Coronet Road near Lombard, where several students from Glenbard South High School in Glen Ellyn drank alcohol.

Four students from the school were charged with possession of alcohol by a minor, said Dawn Domrose, a sheriff's spokeswoman.

She said Holz was related to one of the teens charged, but wouldn't elaborate. Attempts to reach Holz for comment were unsuccessful.

The party came to light after the school's resource officer -- also a DuPage County sheriff's deputy -- discovered pictures from the bash on the popular social networking Web site Facebook.com. Further investigation by the deputy revealed a second party, on New Year's Eve at a home in Lombard.

Lombard police are still investigating that event, said Deputy Police Chief Dane Cuny.

Domrose said the county's investigation is complete and the pictures were removed from the Web site.

Glenbard South Principal Terri Hanrahan said 19 students were identified in the photographs, 11 of whom were athletes. Because the incident occurred off-campus, only the student-athletes could be punished by the school, though all the students' parents were notified of the pictures. She said the students "ran the gamut" of ages, classes and gender.

There were also students from Glenbard East High School in Lombard who appeared in some of the photographs, she said.

The athletes will be suspended from their teams for 20 percent of the scheduled games, she said.

"I'm surprised students would put the pictures up and parents aren't paying closer attention to their child's Facebook pages," Hanrahan said. "The only message we want to send to the kids is doing drugs and drinking alcohol is dangerous and for their own safety we wish they wouldn't use them."

Cuny said Lombard police expect to announce charges against some of the students from both high schools early next week.

It is unclear if Glenbard East administrators have yet taken action against any student-athletes at that school as a result of the published photographs.

Glenbard East officials did not return phone calls Friday.