I, too, was taken aback by your statements, LT52.
Too, I sympathize with the parents who have watched this dreadful scenario unfold.
I would suggest that these kids that have been charged and another 5-10 that they've mentioned (that would be charged), knew exactly what they were doing and had no clue of the potential severity (mandatory jail time for Class X conviction (s)) of the penalty imposed as a consequence of their actions.
Just as the kids with the 12 packs and 24 packs not understanding the consequences of their actions, when, after drinking, they get behind the wheel and kill someone, tough penalties must be imposed. 6 years for a life is not enough.
When you start "dealing" ecstasy, meth and heroin, you're not the "innocent" teen making a few bucks selling joints to your buddies...even though you are stupid and sell them in school!
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Didn't know how to do the "link" thing but I thought someone might want to read the Joliet Herald News story today:
"'What he did was wrong'
• Drug ring alleged: Man describes David Caiafa's troubles after injury
By Joe Hosey
staff writer
JOLIET — On Wednesday morning, David Caiafa was a 17-year-old junior at Joliet Catholic Academy. By afternoon, he was locked up in the county jail and labeled the leader of a teenage drug ring that for months unwittingly peddled dope to undercover cops.
"I don't think he understands what he did," said Caiafa's stepfather, Stan Czyzon. "He doesn't realize what he did and how severe it is."
The charges against Caiafa are severe enough to put him in prison for the next 30 years.
If he had been arrested a mere three months earlier, he would not have been old enough to see the inside of an adult prison and at worst would be in River Valley Juvenile Detention Center, maybe bound for a youth facility, if found guilty.
Such is the plight of another suspect, an unidentified juvenile, according to a police source. The youth is a third-generation Joliet Catholic Academy student and son of a prominent local businessman, the source said.
On the other hand, Caiafa as a 17-year-old is facing Class X felony charges as he sits in jail on $600,000 bond. The charges carry a mandatory prison sentence in the event of a conviction, said State's Attorney James Glasgow, and Czyzon wonders how this could have happened to a boy he says had never run afoul of the law before.
Czyzon said his stepson's problems started when the young man's neck was broken in a June diving accident.
Caiafa, a starter on both the freshman and sophomore football teams, suddenly could no longer play ball. He was subjected to lengthy and intense hospital treatments and to highly addictive pain medication.
An honor student a month before the accident, Caiafa soon slipped into a deep depression, Czyzon said.
But Czyzon and his wife faced the problem head on, or at least thought they had.
"We were in the middle of getting help when all this came down," Czyzon said, telling how they had an appointment with a counselor at Provena Saint Joseph Medical Center the day after Caiafa was pulled out of class at JCA along with four other students and hauled off to jail.
Police took nine teens into custody Wednesday during an investigation dubbed "Operation After School Special." Arrest warrants have been obtained for an additional five youths, and eight of the 14 are JCA students.
Police Chief David Gerdes said the investigation was to run until the end of the school year, but was cut short after an influx of high-grade heroin and a series of teen drug overdoses. Caiafa suffered a drug overdose of his own, Czyzon said.
"We were trying to be as proactive as possible," Czyzon said, telling how his stepson also was meeting with counselors at JCA about his depression and problems with pain medication.
But Czyzon said he and his stepson never broached the issue of whether the young man held sway over a crew of teenage drug peddlers. And after hearing the charges read in court, he questions if the whole drug-dealing operation was not orchestrated by the law.
"It was almost like a programmed deal," he said. "It was like they set these (drug transactions) up to be at a church or a school.
"These detectives, these district attorneys, they all have kids," Czyzon said. "They all know what we're going through. It seems like no one has any compassion."
Czyzon said he knows some of the other teens taken into custody and accused of working in the narcotics crew.
Four of them — two unidentified juveniles along with 17-year-old Benjamin Dilday and 18-year-old Phil Kelly — all attended JCA.
Another, Alexander Bulanda, 18, is a student at Joliet Junior College, and 18-year-old Stephanie Smid is enrolled at Plainfield South High School. Two more 18-year-olds — Jacob Wassner and Justin Iemole — do not go to school, police said.
Only one so far has been able to get bail money together, according to jail records. Someone paid $10,000 cash — 10 percent of his $100,000 bond — to secure the release of Dilday within hours of his arrest.
Caiafa remains in custody and needs $50,000 more than Dilday to get out. And this alone, in light of the broken neck Caiafa suffered less than a year ago, is a cause of concern for Czyzon.
"He's not a violent person," Czyzon said. "If something happened, they could paralyze him."
Besides the present dangers in jail, Czyzon spoke of his worries about his stepson's future as well.
"I want him to get a fair shake," he said. "I know what he did was wrong, but it would be more wrong if he got no help. You're going to lock a kid up, and he's going to be scarred for life."
- Contact Joe Hosey at (815) 729-6054, or e-mail him at jhosey@scn1.com.""
