Judge Extends Protection Order Filed Against D122 VP

Some evidence exists that Sue Gillooley, vice president of the board, stalked another New Lenox woman, a judge ruled Thursday and extended an order of protection to give both women “an opportunity to calm down.”

Kathleen Jackson, 47, , and Will County Associate Judge Victoria Kennison extended it for three months on Thursday. Gillooley, 45, must stay 100 feet away from Jackson, her office and her home. 

Gillooley was re-elected to the District 122 school board in April 2011, her second term on the board. It is an unpaid position. 

According to court testimony, Jackson once dated Gillooley’s current boyfriend and was living with him until recently.

Contact between the women apparently began on Feb. 11, when Gillooley, her children and the man whom they both dated showed up at Jackson’s home to pick up his belongings.

Jackson testified that she refused to open the door and heard Gillooley shouting on the other end of the man’s cell phone, “Come on out.” Jackson said she got a threatening text message later that day from Gillooley stating in part, “Next person you’ll be hearing from is (New Lenox Mayor Tim) Baldermann.”

In court, Gillooley admitted to having sent the text. She also admitted to having visited Jackson’s office on May 14 but claimed she saw a suspicious car outside her house that same morning and only drove to Jackson’s work to see whether they were similar.

Jackson alleged that during the month of April she saw a car resembling Gilooley’s drove by her home in “almost daily.” Gillooley countered by saying she and her children have friends who live in the same subdivision.

Both women have called police on one another, at least once, since February. Jackson filed a harassment claim with the Mokena Police Department in May, days before the court issued an emergency order of protection.

On Thursday, the man at the center of the order refused to comment or say whether he had made any attempts to intervene before things escalated.

Gillooley's attorney, Daniel Kallan, argued that whatever the history between the women, Gillooley’s actions did not rise “to the level of stalking.”

She testified that she had ever seen Jackson and couldn’t have picked her out before Thursday. She also denied having called and harassed Jackson from private phone numbers in April, as Jackson claimed.

Representing herself, Jackson said she was unable to provide the court with her responses to Gillooley’s text messages because she had not saved them.

“I don’t think either party has been 100 percent honest with me,” Judge Kennison said before ruling on what little had been established beyond doubt. To wit, that Gillooley spoke with Jackson in February and then showed up at her work and called her in May.

“The evidence was thin,” Kallan would later say outside the courtroom, with Gillooley at his side. “The judge made her decision. I don’t agree with it, but I believe the order is sufficient to keep the peace.”