Hebron Trustee Knaack resigns after questions raised about possible 30-year-old conviction

Hebron Village Trustee Candace Knaack has resigned from the Village Board after the McHenry County State’s Attorney’s Office inquired as to whether she had a long-ago felony conviction.

Knaack was appointed to the board in September 2022 and was elected to the seat when she ran unopposed last year. Village attorney Michael Smoron said Tuesday that he received “a very succinct resignation letter at approximately 9:30 a.m.” from Knaack.

That resignation came on the heels of a letter from the state’s attorney’s office questioning whether Knaack had a previous felony conviction.

According to the July 31 letter to Knaack from Norman Vinton, chief of the state’s attorney’s civil division, “It has been brought to the state’s attorney’s attention that you may have been convicted of a felony in 1993.”

If so, Illinois municipal code would preclude her from serving as an elected official.

“I urge you to speak with your attorney about your options. If you indeed were convicted of a felony in 1993, even if that felony conviction is sealed, the statute would still apply and would disqualify you from holding that office,” according to the letter.

Publicly available McHenry County court records do not show any felony conviction associated with anyone named Candace Knaack.

However, court records related to a case involving Knaack were sealed in 2021, Vinton told the Northwest Herald. Those records, including the motion requesting to seal them, remain closed to the public and prosecutors unless the state’s attorney’s office asks a judge to unseal them, he said.

That won’t happen now that Knaack has resigned, McHenry County State’s Attorney Patrick Kenneally said.

“It is done. We won’t do another thing,” he said.

Reached by phone Tuesday, Knaack declined to comment.

“I do not care to make a comment about any of this,” she said.

Northwest Herald archives include stories from 1992 and 1993 regarding a Candace L. Knaack of Wonder Lake. An Oct. 15, 1992, news story indicates that the person was indicted by a grand jury on two counts of felony burglary and two counts of theft for incidents in Wonder Lake.

In March 1993, that person also was indicted by a grand jury on felony charges of theft over $300, accused of taking a ring from a resident at the Harvard Home Town Care Center. Because there are no records on those cases publicly available, it’s unclear if those charges resulted in convictions.

“If there was a misunderstanding, and we are not talking about the same person, we would be more than happy to work it out,” Vinton said.

According to the letter to Knaack, there is no timeline in state law for when the felony conviction would have occurred.

Earlier this year, a Algonquin Township trustee lost his fight to retain his seat after a previous felony was discovered. The trusee lost his appeal to the Illinois 2nd District Appellate Court seeking to retain his seat.

Knaack’s departure comes just after the controversial ouster of Hebron’s police chief, Juanita Gumble, whom the village board voted to terminate late last month despite support for Gumble among community members. Knaack was among those board members who voted in favor of terminating Gumble.