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The Probation Violations Although Brady remained a free man after his trial, at least he was on probation, and there was always the possibility that he might violate it. Surely if Brady broke his probation, Piland would move quickly to put him in prison for the protection of the community. As it happens, he did violate his probation - twice. However, it took Piland's office six months to bring charges against Smith. Conflict of Interest Actually Does Apply After All Smith's probation was handled by the Macon County probation office in Decatur. Although 5 years is apparently enough time for a conflict of interest in the State's Attorney's office to dissipate, it still seems to apply in the probation office (Smith was previously a probation officer, and had ties to both offices). He was assigned to Macon County during the stipulated bench trial, so this was worked out during the plea bargain. The first thing Macon County did was require Brady to sign an addendum to his probation agreement, that would not allow him contact with any minors. Violation 1 Travis Welch was Smith's probation officer on Aug 12, 2002, and he, Art Young, and his supervisor, Pat Berter conducted a standard search of Brady's house. They found a box of ammunition, which is a firearm, possession of which is a violation of probation. A few days after the violation, Mr. Welch said that he and Mr. Berter called John Piland to inform him of Brady's probation violation. However, the first public record of anything happening with the violation was on Feb 27, 2003. When I asked Mr. Piland about this gap (since surely if protecting the community was his first priority, it would be moved on immediately), he said that the first he heard about the ammunition charge was in January. He said there was never an official "VOP" or Violation of Probation order sent to him. It isn't clear what was said in that August conversation, but I do believe Mr. Piland knew about the violation in August, not January, as Mr. Welch would have no reason to lie to me about it. Violation 2 On Nov 20, 2002, Mr. Welch again called Mr. Piland to ask that his violation be revoked, because Smith was having illegal contact with minors. This violation was much more serious. Champaign Police had started an investigation on Smith continuing to have contact with minors, and there were a number of times that Smith himself reported having contact. Not only is this a clear violation of probation, it is exactly the kind of thing that leads to more victims. Upon hearing this, any responsible law enforcement officer will act immediately to do what they can to protect those boys, which is what the Champaign Police Department did. Mr. Piland's response here is very strange. Instead of thanking Mr. Welch for a job well done, for following through on his probation duties, Mr. Piland first said that contact with minors was NOT a violation of probation. Then, when Mr. Welch mentioned that this case was hard to monitor, Mr. Piland got angry with Mr. Welch, and proceeded to yell at him and his supervisor, going so far as to say it didn't matter that they couldn't supervise Smith properly. The exchange can be read here. Who knows what was really going on there - it appears there was pre-existing tension between the parties. Mr. Piland believes Macon County was always looking for an excuse to violate probation, and Macon County so far has no comment on any of this, except for a conversation I had with Mr. Welch about when the first violation was reported. Regardless of what lead up to that exchange, the news that Smith was having illegal contact with minors should have caused Piland to immediately act to violate probation. This wasn't a technical charge on ammo - it was a sexual offender engaging in high risk and illegal activities. The Probation Trial Finally, on Feb 27th, 2003 six and half months after the probation violation, and three months after the report of illegal contact with minors, Champaign Officer Morris was told about the ammunition violation, and the evidence was retrieved from Decatur. A trial was held two months later on April 29, 2003 where Smith was found guilty of the probation violation. A sentencing hearing was supposed to be held on 7/2/03, but Smith did not appear in court due to medical problems, and a final sentencing hearing was held 8/11/03. An interesting tidbit from these court appearances: Elizabeth Dobson was again the prosecutor during this trial, and the defense attorney noted that since it took 6 and a half months to bring forward, it "was not a violation that the State obviously was interested in immediately prosecuting". Elizabeth Dobson responded to this, saying in court transcripts about the probation report received from Macon County: "It is only after we received a stack of approximately one inch of single page, single spaced notes that we were able to read through and find in one area a documentation concerning the seizure of ammunition and therefore the criminal violation following that". This contradicts what Macon County probation officer Welch said - that Piland knew about the ammunition violation within a few days of it happening.. Another reason Dobson cites for the delay is that they had to test the ammunition to make sure it was live. According to court records this took 1 day to verify. Even Judge Townshed chides the State's Attorney's office for the handling of the probation violation in the Aug 11, 2003 sentencing trial:
Justice, Finally, Kindof On Aug 11, 2003, almost exactly a full year after his probation violation, Smith was finally sentenced to serve 4 years in prison. Although a technical violation, the fact that he was not making progress in therapy factored into the sentence. Brady Smith is currently due to be released in Feb 2005. This would bring his total amount of time in prison at about one and a half years (plus 3 days, of course, for the original sentence). Next: The Untried Case
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