Grand jury indicts University Park woman
Golf club manager allegedly assaulted the village’s police chief in December
A Will County grand jury indicted University Park Golf Club manager Sonia Coffee for felony assault of a police officer in connection with an alleged Dec. 16 attack on police Chief Deborah Wilson, the Daily Southtown has learned.
The revelation raises fresh questions about Mayor Joseph Roudez and his administration and why the highly regarded police chief has been on administrative leave since the incident.
“Something is very wrong,” said Theo Brooks, a University Park trustee and former police officer.
Brooks has supported resident efforts to pursue accountability regarding the police chief ’s suspension and $800,000 in public funds paid to Coffee’s company, CHW Management Group.
Roudez has refused comment on the chief ’s suspension and incidents at the golf club, citing confidentiality over a personnel matter. But public documents offer insight and seem to support residents’ concerns about why Roudez’s administration sidelined a popular police chief immediately after she became a victim of an alleged felony assault.
The grand jury returned its two-count indictment against Coffee on Jan. 6, according to a copy of a complaint obtained from the Will County state’s attorney’s office. University Park police rejected a request through the Freedom of Information Act for copies of reports, citing confidentiality.
In addition to the felony charge of aggravated battery to a police officer, Coffee faces a misdemeanor charge of resisting arrest.
“(Coffee) made physical contact of an insulting or provoking nature with Debbie Wilson, knowing Debbie Wilson to be a peace officer performing her official duties, in that said defendant pushed Debbie Wilson about her body,” according to the complaint.
Coffee said her attorney advised her to not comment on the incident.
The grand jury also indicted DeVaughn J. Mathus on identical charges of felony aggravated battery to a police officer and misdemeanor resisting arrest for allegedly shoving Wilson.
Brooks said he believes the village should publicly release a video recording that shows the Dec. 16 altercation that led in the felony charge against Coffee.
“Our police chief went up there for an investigation that escalated,” Brooks said. “The board has seen the videotape. It’s very horrific.
Chief Wilson was indeed battered. Actually I’m just embarrassed by the way everything is unfolding.”
In a written report provided to the University Park Village Board, Coffee wrote that an “unfortunate incident” occurred while the chief was at the club. Wilson was investigating the whereabouts of maintenance equipment purportedly purchased with taxpayer funds for the publicly owned golf course, Brooks said.
Brooks and residents have asked Coffee to provide receipts and to account for money purportedly spent on lawn mowers and other equipment. A board majority recently supported Brooks’ motion to withhold more than $50,000 in payments owed to Coffee’s management company until she reports to the board.
Brooks and residents have questioned why Village Manager Ernestine Beck-Fulgham placed Wilson on paid administrative leave Dec. 16, the day of the incident at the golf club.
A week later, during a Dec. 23 special meeting, a board majority rejected Roudez’s attempt to appoint Ed Bradley, a former police chief of University Park, to an interim role as acting police chief while Wilson was on leave.
Six days later, on Dec. 29, Wilson filed a discrimination complaint with the Illinois Department of Human Rights. Wilson is University Park’s first female police chief and the first Black female police chief of any community in Will County.
The Daily Southtown obtained a copy of the complaint, in which Wilson alleged she was being retaliated against because she was an eyewitness to another village employee’s sexual harassment complaint against Beck-Fulgham.
“I believe that my employer is retaliating against me because I reported these illegal activities or agreed to be a witness in another employee’s sexual harassment claim against the manager,” Wilson wrote.
In February, Brooks and Trustee Sonia Jenkins-Bell publicly released a letter in which they called for Beck-Fulgham to resign for awarding more than $54,000 in cash bonuses to 61 employees, including $3,500 for herself, without Village Board knowledge or approval.
“What infuriates me even more is that Ernestine still has not been handled by the board for the money she took,” Brooks said Friday. “It’s unheard of. The board should be more upset about Ernestine taking the money.”
Roudez recently told me the money Beck-Fulgham awarded to employees as cash bonuses was revenue from permit fees.
“There was nothing stolen,” Roudez said. “It’s a policy violation, nothing criminal. When people commit criminal acts they do not go to the bank and get cashier’s checks.”
Roudez told me in late March that he would order Beck-Fulgham to repay to the village the $3,500 bonus she paid to herself without authorization. However, Brooks said that hasn’t happened yet.
Ordering Beck-Fulgham to repay her bonus would seem to indicate an admission of wrongdoing. It also begs the question, if the village manager’s bonus was wrong, what about the $50,000 in bonuses paid to 60 other workers? Should they return the taxpayer money spent without authorization as well, or should Beck-Fulgham repay the full $54,000?
Beck-Fulgham did not immediately respond Friday to a request for comment. Roudez declined to discuss specifics of Beck-Fulgham’s bonus scandal when we spoke. He defended the funds paid to Coffee’s company to operate the course, saying a previous manager neglected the facility.
“The equipment was 30 years old,” Roudez said. “The equipment had never been replaced. The place was a complete shambles.”
Later, I accepted the village’s invitation to meet with Coffee, tour the golf club and listen to Coffee’s explanations of maintenance needs. The tour felt like the village was trying to use a publicity stunt to divert attention from the police chief situation, when village officials have known since Jan. 6 about the criminal indictment against Coffee.
The truth will come out, especially if there is video evidence of the alleged assault. Coffee is due back in court in May to answer the criminal charges.