A ceremony on Friday was supposed to be about honoring a Kane County sheriff’s police dog named Hudson who was killed in a deadly incident in 2023 at a busy intersection on the border of Batavia and Geneva.
The agency unveiled a statue dedicated to the Dutch shepherd accidentally shot by deputies as they fired at and killed carjacking suspect James Moriarty as he fled on foot from a stolen car with what appeared to be a handgun.
But the event drummed up more ugly words from Kane County Sheriff Ron Hain — who essentially blamed Aurora police for the dog’s death — and a blistering response from Aurora Mayor Richard Irvin who called the sheriff’s remarks “laughingly incredible and absolutely wrong, but sadly, indicative of the Ron Hain playbook.”
Hain said at the ceremony that Aurora police “refuse to work jointly with us” despite offers of greater cooperation, and he fears “going forward more citizens” and police “could be hurt” as a result.
“And K-9 Hudson is a standing example of what happens when you don’t work together on a cohesive basis,” Hain said.
While his agency patrols unincorporated areas adjacent to Aurora, the far western suburb’s police force patrols within its borders. Much of the sprawling town of roughly 180,000 people is in Kane County.
The day before Moriarty was killed, Aurora police records say the sheriff fouled up an undercover surveillance operation Aurora cops were conducting outside of Moriarty’s local apartment.
Moriarty had “active warrants for robbery and aggravated fleeing and eluding,” records show. His family and friends said his mental health had been spiraling, and he’d resumed heavy drug use after 1 1/2 years of sobriety. He’d apparently tried to kill himself not long before in a drug overdose.
The aim of Aurora police was to use the element of surprise to arrest Moriarty without a violent confrontation.
Then sheriff’s deputies rolled onto the scene in marked squad cars, without regard for the surveillance or Aurora’s request that they stay away. The deputies said they were there to seize the car by “order of the sheriff,” records show.
That destroyed the surveillance operation, and the hours of work put in by Aurora police.
When Moriarty emerged from his apartment the next morning to find his car gone, he carjacked a woman at a Jiffy Lube and got into a car chase with sheriff’s police that ended with a collision and brief foot chase before he was shot to death by deputies at Fabyan Parkway and Randall Road.
They had unleashed Hudson at Moriarty, and the dog was also killed in the gunfire.
Hain was quoted in a Chicago Sun-Times story from this past May blaming Aurora police for being “reactive” by just “sitting” on Moriarty’s apartment and called his department “proactive.”
“That type of police work is baiting someone to get into a pursuit,” Hain said about Aurora’s actions. “I would say they escalated things. … Get a warrant, and go in to the apartment … grab the guy.”
Irvin, who oversees Aurora police, subsequently ripped the sheriff at a City Council meeting, saying “the mistake that caused the unfortunate loss of life was his and his alone.”
Irvin added, “The events that followed” the botched surveillance operation “were unfortunate and likely preventable if Sheriff Hain himself, who was not on the scene himself, had let our officers do their job.”
After Hain’s more recent remarks at the event for Hudson, Irvin released a statement saying, “As usual, Sheriff Hain takes every opportunity to bring the spotlight to himself, even during a ceremony reserved to commemorate the life of a brave canine officer.”
“Ron’s ‘knight on a white horse’ mentality is exactly the reason so many in the county have issues with him. His statement today blaming the City of Aurora for the death of the canine officer were laughingly incredible and absolutely wrong, but sadly, indicative of the Ron Hain playbook.
“When the full investigation is complete, we will, indeed, see who is really to blame. He was correct about one thing. This unfortunate situation was due to the lack of communication, but not on our part. It was solely on Hain.”
Kane County State’s Attorney Jamie Mosser, who is overseeing the ongoing investigation over Moriarty’s shooting, attended Friday’s event which she said “should’ve been about honoring Hudson.”
She said about Hain’s remarks, “I do not agree that Aurora was in any way at fault.”