Ex-Cook county employee to remain in jail

A former county employee hired by Cook County Board President Todd Stroger remained in jail Wednesday after a judge agreed his bond should remain high because he violated the terms of his home confinement on a domestic charge.

Tony Cole, 29, of Chicago was working as a busboy when Stroger hired him as an aide to his chief financial officer and cousin, Donna Dunnings. Cole later was arrested on a domestic battery charge in DuPage County, accused of punching his girlfriend in the face. He pleaded guilty and paid a fine, but was rearrested when he was accused of violating an order of protection the woman had obtained.

Dunnings then twice bailed Cole out of jail. Stroger fired Cole and then later asked for Dunnings' resignation when he said Cole began making "explosive" allegations against her. He did not detail what those allegations were.

Tuesday's hearing at Cook County's Domestic Court was merely to determine whether Cole's bond should be raised from $40,000 to $200,000 because he did not answer his door on three separate occasions when probation officers visited him at home. Conditions of his bond required him to do so.

Cole's public defender Peter D. Bormes implied Cole was being treated more stringently than other defendants facing a "class A misdemeanor." Bormes said Cole was being visited inordinately often - 76 times in 64 days, with some visits coming literally one minute after a previous one and sometimes at 1 a.m. and 2 a.m. in the morning.

Cole seemed to agree, piping up, "This is nothing but a conspiracy," before being silenced by the judge.

But assistant state's attorney Sara Sohn said the number was not inordinate for the type of home confinement Cole was on, an intensive visitation schedule under the new Cindy Bischof law designed specially to protect domestic abuse victims. She also said that Cole was verbally combative during visits and boasted to probation officers that he "knew the judge."

Judge James Patrick Murphy noted for the record that he was not sure if Cole was referring to him, but that the two did not know each other. He also found that Cole had violated the terms of home confinement and ordered the bond to remain at $200,000, of which Cole must post $20,000 to be released.

Jesus Reyes, the interim chief of the Cook County Adult Probation department said the number of visitations Cole received were normal. The Bischof law intended to secure domestic abusers with GPS tracking devices, but until the equipment can be purchased, Reyes said, the county is obeying the spirit of the law by visiting those on home confinement about once a day.

"The number of visits that Mr. Cole has is average for this population," said Reyes.