Kane County Sheriff Ron Hain recently slammed Aurora police, saying they were too passive and “reactive” in trying to arrest a suspect the night before he was shot and killed by Hain’s deputies in a violent broad-daylight encounter on the Batavia-Geneva border last year.
Among other things, Hain called the Aurora police “clowns.”
Now, Aurora Mayor Richard Irvin is pushing back hard against Hain’s remarks — many of which were included in a recent Chicago Sun-Times story about events leading up to the fatal shooting of Jim Moriarty on May 24, 2023 — essentially blaming Hain for the deadly confrontation because he “compromised” an Aurora police undercover operation the night before that could have led to Moriarty’s arrest without the loss of life.
“The mistake that caused the unfortunate loss of life was his and his alone,” Irvin said at an Aurora City Council meeting last week, referring to Hain. “And he ought to accept the responsibility for it, instead of interjecting misplaced and unsubstantiated conjecture, rumors and innuendo.”
“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.”
Hain has called similar sentiments raised by Moriarty’s family and friends “ridiculous.”
Asked about Irvin’s comments, Hain told the Sun-Times over the weekend, “You’re listening to people who have no idea what they’re talking about and with zero evidence behind it.”
“Irvin’s comments were reckless and inappropriate. We towed the car based on our case, and we caught the offender after a week of chaos. That’s the end of the story.”
While Moriarty’s shooting death was a full year ago, the investigation into it is only now wrapping up, with Kane County State’s Attorney Jamie Mosser soon expected to decide whether criminal charges are warranted against police or anyone.
As the Sun-Times recently reported, Aurora police began an undercover surveillance operation in town on May 23, 2023, quietly watching Moriarty’s car that was parked near his apartment, waiting for him to come out so they could arrest him using the element of surprise.
He had been in a series of car chases and 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 recently resumed heavy drug use following a year and a half of sobriety. He’d apparently tried to kill himself not long before in a drug overdose.
Moriarty, who grew up in Alsip, was inside his nearby apartment, but Aurora police didn’t want to barge in and force a confrontation or escalate things needlessly given the uncertainty of whether he had a gun, and his recent remarks about committing “suicide by cop.”
Then Kane County sheriff’s deputies rolled onto the scene in marked squad cars, without regard for the surveillance or Aurora’s request that they stay away. They said they were there to seize the car by “order of the sheriff.”
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 local Jiffy Lube and got into a chase with sheriff’s police that ended with him being shot to death by deputies at a busy intersection, Fabyan Parkway and Randall Road.
The Sun-Times published details from Aurora police reports that were critical of Hain for allegedly escalating things indirectly, but he in turn tore into Aurora police for simply “sitting” on Moriarty’s car the night before his death.
“That type of police work is baiting someone to get into a pursuit,” Hain says. “I would say they escalated things ... get a warrant, and go in to the apartment ... grab the guy.”
He said he stood by his actions to “take that weapon away,” meaning Moriarty’s vehicle, though he says he also apologized because he hadn’t realized the level of Aurora’s surveillance operation when he ordered his people in.
Irvin, a onetime Republican candidate for governor who as mayor oversees the Aurora Police Department, said after reading Hain’s remarks in the newspaper, he couldn’t let them “go unanswered.”
“Our officers waited by Moriarty’s parked car to arrest him in the safest manner possible as he attempted to gain access to his vehicle,” Irvin said. “Unfortunately, this operation was compromised when the sheriff’s deputies, acting under the direct orders of Sheriff Hain himself, appeared on the scene and seized Moriarty’s vehicle — despite our officers’ immediate explanation as to what they were doing in the APD operation and why.”
“I absolutely disagree with Sheriff Hain ... there is nothing ‘reactive’ about trying to arrest a suspect using a coordinated effort with the least amount of force and exposing the subject, and our officers, to the least amount of danger possible. Not only is that good police work, it saves lives.”
“Just as Sheriff Hain apologized for his actions in the wake of what followed, he should apologize for his careless and consequential directives that night and his continued attacks on the Aurora Police Department a year later.”
Irvin wouldn’t comment beyond his public remarks.
