Joliet Police Supervisor's Trailer Theft Case Ends 6 Years Later

Joliet IL

04 November, 2021

11:42 PM

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JOLIET, IL — More than six years after ex-Joliet Police Sgt. Henry Dahl was put in the Kankakee County Jail in connection with allegations that he stole a utility trailer in the middle of the night, Dahl's criminal case has been dismissed, Joliet Patch has confirmed. A clerk for Dahl's private criminal defense lawyer, Jeffrey Godin of Bourbonnais, told Joliet Patch that Dahl's felony charges were dismissed in August or September. A member of the Kankakee County Circuit Court's staff later told Patch that Dahl's criminal case has been expunged from the court system, and she cannot provide any additional information about that case. Earlier this week, Joliet Patch discovered the court records for Kankakee County no longer contained Dahl's felony theft case, which had been posted online since July 2015. Dahl, who turns 46 in December, was 39 years old at the time of his arrest on July 29, 2015. Dahl resigned from the Joliet Police Department by the end of that year. In October 2018, Dahl stood trial at the Kankakee County Courthouse in connection with the trailer theft charges, but the jury deadlocked and could not reach a unanimous decision. There was an expectation that Dahl would be re-tried a second time, but that never happened, and now Dahl's 2015 felony charges have been removed from his permanent record. In October 2018, Joliet Patch reported that at the time of Sgt. Dahl's arrest, Joliet Police Chief Brian Benton did not take any immediate steps to fire Dahl. Brian Benton, at the podium, decided not to fire Sgt. Henry Dahl following his arrest in Kankakee County on felony theft charges. File/John Ferak/Patch Instead, Benton chose to put Dahl on indefinite paid suspension, allowing Dahl to continue to accumulate more sick and vacation time in the process. At the time of Dahl's felony arrest, he was rising through the ranks of the Joliet police administration on the verge of being promoted to a lieutenant. After four months of paid leave, Dahl was allowed to quietly resign from the Joliet police force and Benton and Deputy Chief of Administration Tab Jensen decided not to publicize Dahl's departure. Here's a review of the key events for Sgt. Dahl's summer 2015 arrest in Kankakee County: Charge: Theft between $500 and $10,000, a Class 3 felony. Incident Summary: At 5:30 a.m. police in Kankakee were summoned to a utility trailer theft in progress behind the Consignments and More shop. "Officers were advised by dispatch that a witness saw a white male wearing a black jacket, driving a black pickup north from the store," Kankakee's Daily Journal newspaper reported. "The witness said the trailer became unhitched, and the suspect pulled into the parking lot of a business in Bradley where officers apprehended him. Dahl was wearing latex gloves when police took him into custody. He also gave officers a fake name and the Kankakee address he gave was an abandoned house," Joliet Patch has previously reported. The unsuccessful prosecution of Dahl's case was handled by Charles Colburn of the State of Illinois Special Prosecutor Unit. Former Joliet Police Sgt. Henry Dahl's felony charges of stealing a trailer have been dismissed in Kankakee County. Mugshot via Kankakee County police