Chicago man charged with threatening Lombard police officer

A Chicago man has been charged with threatening to shoot a Lombard police officer.

Daryl Meeks, 41, of the 5400 block of West Haddon Avenue, was arrested shortly before 2 a.m. Thursday. According to authorities, a patrol officer saw a vehicle driving erratically, then stop in the middle of Roosevelt Road.

The officer approached the vehicle and reported smelling alcohol and burnt marijuana. Meeks failed field sobriety tests, according to a news release from the DUPage County state's attorney's office.

At the Lombard police station, Meeks asked how long the officer had been on the police force. When told it was six years, Meeks made a gun shape with his hands and said, "He won't make it to seven years," according to the news release.

Authorities said Meeks told the officer that if he had had his gun with him, "I woulda shot the (expletive) out you when you asked me to step out the vehicle."

Meeks faces two felony counts of threatening a public official, one count of misdemeanor driving under the influence of alcohol, and traffic charges of illegal stopping/standing/parking in a roadway, improper lane use, failure to signal while changing lanes, operating an uninsured motor vehicle, speeding and illegal transportation of open alcohol by a driver.

"My office takes any threat or even the perception of a threat against a public employee or elected official extremely seriously," State's Attorney Robert Berlin said in the news release.

Bail was set Wednesday afternoon at $150,000, meaning Meeks would need to post $15,000 to be freed pretrial.