Judge scolds, lowers bond for teen charged with trying to cheat drug test

An Island Lake teen accused of bringing someone else's urine for a court-ordered drug test was free Thursday after a judge reduced his bond, but not before he first got a scolding from the judge.

Justin C. Head, 18, posted $500 bond Thursday afternoon to get out of the McHenry County jail, where he had been held since Monday on a felony charge of defrauding a drug and alcohol screening test.

McHenry County Sheriff's police said deputies arrested Head after he strapped a condom filled with someone else's urine and smuggled it into the county courthouse, where he was scheduled to take a drug test in the county's probation department. He also brought a small piece of a razor blade hidden in his mouth to puncture the condom for the test, police said.

He was caught trying to pass off the urine as his own and now Head, of the 100 block of South Circle Drive, faces a Class 4 felony charge punishable by a maximum one to three years in prison.

McHenry County Judge Sharon Prather granted a defense motion Thursday to lower Head's bond from $1,000 to $500, but first let him know what she thought of the case after hearing a recap of the allegations.

"If the facts are as the state has proffered, you did do something very stupid," Prather said.

Head was ordered to undergo drug testing as part of a probation sentence issued in a felony theft conviction out of Kane County and a court supervision sentence handed down in McHenry County for a misdemeanor marijuana possession charge.

He is scheduled to return to court Nov. 5 for what likely will be an arraignment.