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March 18, 2024

Effingham County’s Motion to Dismiss FOIA case denied.

By Kirk Allen & John Kraft

On September 19, 2018

Effingham Co. (ECWd) –

We sued the County of Effingham for failure to provide key financial records related to the payment of a private attorney to handle the County Ambulance contract.  We covered that flawed hiring process in this article.  Flawed because the court directed the appointment of an Assistant States Attorney to represent the county and the fact pattern is pointing to that not actually happening.

During the hearing for the Motion to Dismiss, State’s Attorney Brian Kibler stated that the payments made were to a private attorney contracted by the insurance company.  If that is true, then the court’s order for the person to be an Assistant State’s Attorney was not followed.

The Court ruled that the County has until October 10th, 2018 to file their ANSWER to our Amended Complaint.

PLAINTIFF BY ATTORNEY BURDAY; DEFENDANT COUNTY OF EFFINGHAM BY SA KIBLER. ARGUMENTS PRESENTED REGARDING DEFENDANT’S COMBINED MOTION TO DISMISS (FILED ON 5/11/18). MATTER TAKEN UNDER ADVISEMENT. THIS MATTER HAVING COME BEFORE THE COURT ON 9/11/18 FOR HEARING ON DEFENDANT COUNTY OF EFFINGHAM’S COMBINED MOTION TO DISMISS (FILED ON 5/11/18), AND THE COURT HAVING TAKEN THE MATTER UNDER ADVISEMENT, THE COURT NOW RULES AS FOLLOWS: (A) DEFENDANT’S 2-619 MOTION TO DISMISS IS DENIED, WITHOUT PREJUDICE TO DEFENDANT’S RAISING SAID ISSUES IN ANY ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSE, OR MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT; (B) DEFENDANT’S 2-615 MOTION TO DISMISS IS DENIED; (C) DEFENDANT SHALL FILE ITS ANSWER TO THE PLAINTIFF’S AMENDED COMPLAINT WITHIN 30 DAYS (ON OR BEFORE 10/10/18). CLERK TO SEND A COPY OF THIS DOCKET ENTRY ORDER TO BOTH COUNSEL OF RECORD.

We are confident that sooner or later we will obtain the total of the actual payments made to the private attorney. To date, we only have invoices submitted that included divorce matters which had nothing to do with county business pertaining to the ambulance contract.

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4 Comments
  • Dave
    Posted at 12:56h, 19 September

    It appears the games have begun….

  • jannie
    Posted at 13:14h, 19 September

    thanks interesting.

  • Craig Barnes
    Posted at 12:44h, 20 September

    Been trying to get a response from the interim Effingham County Coroner for several weeks regarding a suspicious death in May and a rash of heroin overdoses a few months ago. Her lack of response was then followed by simply being difficult. Oh, well, I suppose the Illinois Attorney General’s Office can sort this out…

    • jmkraft
      Posted at 22:05h, 20 September

      Wasn’t she appointed to that vacancy even though she voted the opposite party last election?

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