An Unscheduled Outage

Lent is a time for sacrifice -- for the faithful this can range from the meatless Friday to some of the more extreme rituals practiced in foreign countries. It should be no surprise that Lake County's presiding Penitente -- Sheriff Mark Curran -- had a press conference scheduled on Good Friday to announce his latest public display of self-mortification. Reality, however, intervened first. Curran, according to News-Sun ...

has cancelled plans to make a return trip to his jail as part of an effort to show faith in the correctional staff after two deaths have been linked to stays in the county facility in downtown Waukegan. One inmate starved herself to death and another suffered injuries that may have contributed to his death. Curran had planned on holding a press conference today, to announce his return as an inmate to the jail. "Sheriff Curran will spend a week in the jail as a show of faith he personally has in his corrections personnel. Given the recent publicity regarding events that have occurred in the jail, Sheriff Curran would like to take this opportunity to highlight the realities of the exceptional treatment of the inmates at the jail, as well as the dedication of the correctional officers that serve them," read the Friday announcement from the sheriff. Curran said he canceled the jail stay due to a scheduling conflict.
Sheriff cancels planned jail stay

It has never occurred to your LakeCountyEye to cite a "scheduling conflict" as an excuse for getting out of doing Lenten penitence. To be sure, elected officials will appeal to a fictitious conflict in their schedules to get out of doing things they don't want to do. Curran's own attorney James Sotos admitted as much to the Daily Herald:

Sheriff Mark Curran had planned to spend this week as an inmate in the jail as a show of the faith he has in corrections personnel, but he canceled those plans because of a "scheduling conflict," according to a news release from his office. Sotos said he advised Curran to cancel the news conference that was supposed to accompany the self-imposed incarceration. "I simply advised my clients that, as the targets of legal action, I was not comfortable with a public discussion of the issues in this case," Sotos said. "I am the scheduling conflict in this matter."
Special investigator assigned to Lake County jail death case

Haha, for a public official to be caught in a lie is one thing. But to be outed by one's own attorney is something else entirely. Note to all elected officials: You may want to give up telling whoppers for Lent next year. Or at least hire legal counsel that can coverup for you with a straight face.