Elgin woman charged with bringing drugs into DuPage jail
An Elgin hairdresser released from jail Tuesday will be headed right back behind bars if DuPage prosecutors have their way.
Jennifer Perik, 43, of the 300 block of Gladstone Lane, completed a 120-day sentence on aggravated identity theft charges Tuesday. But prosecutors said it's what she brought into the DuPage County jail on July 8 that landed her back in hot water.
She now faces felony charges of bringing illegal contraband into a penal institution and possessing illegal contraband in a penal institution. She is not eligible for probation on the new charges.
Assistant State's attorney Diane Michalak said deputies discovered 15 Xanax pills in Perik's cell on Aug. 3, when they were gathering her belongings to move her to a different pod in the jail. Michalak said Perik then admitted to bringing 24 Xanax pills into the jail when she surrendered on July 8 by concealing them under her breast.
Sheriff's officials said Perik was not strip-searched upon entering the jail because there was no probable cause to do so.
According to court documents, Perik suffers from "depression with suicidal tendencies, which has been aggravated by postnatal/postpartum depression."
Judge John Kinsella on Monday is expected to consider Michalak's motion to revoke the sentence Perik just completed and impose a new one. According to court documents, the new charges constitute a violation of the probation Perik is on until Aug. 20 2019.
Between August and December 2014, Perik, who was the victim's hairdresser, used a 93-year-old woman's credit card 39 times to ring up nearly $6,100 in charges.
Perik spent more than $3,000 on cellphone and communication services. The remaining $3,000, Michalak said, was spent on fertility vitamins and donor sperm from a Virginia-based fertility website.
Perik had a daughter on Nov. 17, 2015, as a result of one of the five sperm samples she purchased with the victim's credit card.
Last August, Kinsella sentenced Perik to 120 days in jail and four years of probation and ordered her to pay restitution to the victim.
Prosecutors said Perik had been styling both the victim's and the victim's daughter's hair for several years. The victim's daughter noticed the charges in April 2015 and called police.
The single largest charge to the Virginia clinic - $2,200 - was made on Christmas Day 2014.
Michalak said the clinic told police that Perik said she was the victim's granddaughter.
Perik is currently free on $25,000 bail in her new case.