Judge reduces Crystal Lake man’s bond in drug-induced homicide case

A McHenry County judge Friday reduced the bond of a Crystal Lake man charged with drug-induced homicide, criminal drug conspiracy and other charges in connection with the fatal overdose of a 27-year-old man.

Jacob Stealy, 24, is one of two men charged with drug-induced homicide and criminal drug conspiracy charged in the fatal overdose of Colton Steiner of Crystal Lake. Stealy also is charged with indirect criminal contempt, according to the indictment filed in the McHenry County courthouse.

McHenry County Judge Robert Wilbrandt reduced his bond from $250,000 to $170,000, higher than the $50,000 his attorney requested.

Assistant State’s Attorney Ken Hudson said during the bond hearing Friday that Stealy did not cooperate with an interview with McHenry County Sheriff’s Detective Keith Sosnowski during an investigation into Steiner’s death. He also failed to respond to a subpoena ordering him to testify at a grand jury in December about Steiner’s death, leading to the contempt charge.

Stealy’s father, Kurt Stealy, who was present in court Friday, said he had sent his son to a drug rehabilitation facility in California around the time Sosnowski attempted to interview him and the subpoena was executed. His son was not “dodging” the subpoena; he “was deep in his addiction,” Kurt Stealy told the judge.

Following Steiner’s death on June 23, Stealy first spent 38 days in a local rehabilitation facility, defense attorney Dane Loizzo said. His brother then drove him to California where he spent three months in another rehab. When he returned to Crystal Lake, he “voluntarily turned himself in,” Loizzo said.

“He hit rock bottom, and he was going through withdrawals,” Kurt Stealy said. “We had to get him away from the people he was hanging around with, so he didn’t end up dead. We had an intervention and said ‘enough is enough.’ We have gone down this road before. We were at the point he was going to die.”

Stealy is “actively in recovery,” has a sponsor in California and is seeking one in Woodstock, Loizzo said.

Expecting his son’s bond would be reduced to $50,000, Kurt Stealy had come to court Friday prepared to post $5,000, the 10% that would have been required to secure his release. That amount was the same required for Ryan G. James, of Crystal Lake, who also was charged with drug-induced homicide and criminal drug conspiracy in connection to Steiner’s death.

A third man, Lucious Hemphill of Carol Stream, was charged with calculated criminal conspiracy, according to a criminal complaint. Hemphill was not charged with drug-induced homicide, but is accused of delivering fentanyl pills to James and Stealy on June 23, the day Steiner died, according to court records.

Hudson said the $50,000 bond for James was too low and information was found on Stealy’s cellphone and on other phones, showing he had an ongoing drug business with James.

Loizzo described the exchanging of drugs among the three men as mutual, with James sometimes selling to Stealy, Stealy sometimes providing pills to Steiner and Steiner sometimes providing to Stealy. He also said it is Stealy’s constitutional right to not speak with the detective and that fact should not be “spun in a negative light.”

According to the motion prosecutors filed in March, James told police he had been purchasing about 100 pressed fentanyl pills every one or two weeks and selling them. James identified Hemphill as “his exclusive source for the pills,” prosecutors said in the motion.

Officers then arranged for Hemphill to bring 100 fentanyl pills to a designated location, and Hemphill arrived there with 123 pills that field tested positive for fentanyl, according to the motion.

As of Monday a $250,000 warrant for Hemphill’s arrest remained active, according to court documents.