09/14/2026
Oh look finally people getting the truth out about the Kane County sheriff’s office… where sheriff Ron Hain hasn’t plugged into his computer since the first quarter of the year and his wife Ashley was apparently in charge of FOIA at the office. So it was very difficult to get information through FOIA out. Total good ‘ole boys protection system there. https://www.facebook.com/share/1DBJhrsS9K/?mibextid=wwXIfr
The Kane County Reporter published allegations that a second whistleblower has come forth from the Kane County Sheriff’s office highlighting very concerning things, including that the office is “corrupted” and there is a very “toxic work environment” going on while undersheriff Amy Johnson heads up the office without Democrat Sheriff Ron Hain.
— As Reported:
A second Kane County Sheriff’s Office employee has come forward to the Kane County Reporter, alleging a department run by a “blue code” that protects favored officers, including one allegedly caught drinking on the job at more than three times the legal limit.
The employee also described Undersheriff Amy Johnson, a candidate for sheriff on the Nov. 3 ballot, as unqualified to be running the office. Johnson has served as undersheriff since 2022.
The employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity, is the second Sheriff’s Office whistleblower to speak with the Kane County Reporter in recent weeks about conditions inside the department.
The department has been operating without its elected sheriff, Ron Hain, since at least February amid still-unexplained questions about his health.
The first whistleblower described a “toxic working environment” under Hain and Johnson, alleging favoritism in promotions and lax discipline for on-duty drinking.
(https://kanecountyreporter.com/kane-county-sheriff-s-office-whistleblower-calls-out-conditions-under-hain-johnson-it-s-a-toxic-working-environment)
This second account echoes and expands on those claims, with a particular focus on what the employee called the “blue code” and on Johnson’s qualifications to lead the department.
‘The blue code’
The whistleblower described a two-tiered system inside the department in which discipline depends less on conduct than on personal relationships with command staff.
“They don’t follow policy at all, and when you do question their policy, they end up targeting you, especially when it comes to the drinking of officers coming in to work drunk,” the whistleblower said.
“It’s selective harassment. If you are not in their blue code, you’re going to get harassed. If you don’t do what they want you to do, you’re gonna get harassed.”
The whistleblower said the pattern held even for serious misconduct.
“It’s a complete situation there and it’s not being taken care of because it’s the buddy system,” the employee said. “So you protect your buddy.”
The whistleblower described a broader pattern in which officers who follow policy and decline to participate in the department’s informal power structure are pushed out, while those protected by the “blue code” continue to advance regardless of misconduct.
“Officers that you can trust to do the right thing, that’s the problem, because they follow the right side of the law. They didn’t want them,” the whistleblower said.
Asked why officers who play by the rules don’t advance within the department, the whistleblower was direct: “Because they don’t do the blue code. That’s why.”
Officers who won’t go along, the whistleblower said, are “basically ousted because they didn’t conform to their code of blue,” even as officers with documented misconduct continue to be retained and promoted.
Asked about the consequences of speaking up, the whistleblower said those who press the issue face retaliation dressed up as routine oversight.
“The people that want to deal with the situation any longer and speak up about it, get harassed,” the whistleblower said.
“They do it kind of like underneath the rug kind of type of harassment. If they can find a way, they’re going to find a way to harass you with investigations. I don’t know how many times I was pulled up into investigation for s**t that I didn’t do. It’s just their way of harassing.”
The whistleblower described one case in which an officer was disciplined over having the wrong earpiece.
“The piddly s**t that they’re hitting people for, like an earpiece, that’s just them harassing the officer,” the whistleblower said.
The whistleblower said the officer was placed on paid leave for seven months over an unauthorized earpiece, then given 17 additional days without pay and a “last chance” disciplinary letter.
“This last chance letter, basically, you could s**t the wrong way and he’s fired,” the whistleblower said.
Officer allegedly blew a 0.286, was back at work within weeks
The whistleblower said the clearest example of the department’s tolerance for on-duty drinking involved an officer who arrived at work roughly 45 minutes to an hour late.
“I told the sergeant, I said, you need to breathalyze him. He’s drunk,” the whistleblower said.
The test, the whistleblower said, came back at more than three times the legal limit for driving.
“That was a 0.286 that he blew,” the employee said. “And then nothing happened. He was out for a little bit of time, but he was right back within probably two, a week or two.”
The whistleblower said the incident wasn’t isolated and that the department has no meaningful consequence for the offense.
“There’s no reprimandation for coming into work drunk,” the whistleblower said. “There’s nothing.”
Meanwhile, the employee said the department had no functioning internal affairs process.
The whistleblower alleged the same officer was later moved into a role that involves driving.
“Why would you do that when you know his background?” the whistleblower said. “So now you’re putting another officer in danger that won’t know if he’s sober or not.”
The whistleblower said another officer separately reported for coming to work drunk faced no discipline either.
“Nothing was done,” the whistleblower said.
The whistleblower added that the second officer had reportedly had conduct issues as an officer at a prior police department before joining the Kane County Sheriff’s Office.
Whistleblower says Johnson unqualified, owes her rise to relationships
The whistleblower was sharply critical of Johnson, the undersheriff who has run the department’s patrol operations during Hain’s absence and who is the Democratic nominee to succeed him in the Nov. 3 election against Republican Rob Russell, a former three-term Kane County coroner.
“Johnson never passed a sergeant’s exam. She never passed anything,” the whistleblower said.
“And she keeps on saying, ‘I can run this department.’ Then run it. Start running it now. She hasn’t done anything. She makes all these promises, but there’s no follow through.”
The employee also alleged the department’s rank-and-file union endorsed Johnson’s campaign because of a personal friendship with the union steward, who is a sergeant under her command, rather than her record.
“The union ended up endorsing her, because they’re friends,” the whistleblower said.
“The president of the union and her are buddy-buddy.”
Asked about conditions since Johnson took over day-to-day leadership of patrol operations in Hain’s absence, the whistleblower did not hold back.
“Because Hain is not there, she’s the one taking the reins,” the whistleblower said.
“I haven’t seen anything change for the better at all. And I for sure haven’t heard it, it’s gotten worse. It has gotten 120 times worse.”
Budget overruns add to the scrutiny
The whistleblower’s account comes as the Sheriff’s Office faces separate scrutiny over roughly $10.8 million in spending above approved budgets from 2023 through the current budget period.
County Board members have questioned how the overruns occurred without formal budget amendments or reconciliation, though officials have said some of the overages could reflect timing and structural budget issues.
https://kanecountyreporter.com/kane-county-board-members-question-sheriff-office-budget-overruns-exceeding-10-5-million-amid-ongoing-leadership-and-oversight-questions)
Departments are generally expected to seek board approval when they anticipate exceeding their budgets.
Johnson repeatedly failed to give board members a clear answer despite months of requests. She was scheduled to address the board about the overruns in April but did not appear until a July 14 meeting, and even then declined to say how much additional funding the department needs.
https://kanecountyreporter.com/kane-county-undersheriff-johnson-declines-to-give-budget-figure-amid-10-8m-in-sheriff-office-overruns)
“I’m not prepared to actually state in front of everybody how much we actually need right now,” Johnson told the board.
She also noted she preferred to discuss the figure in executive session rather than publicly.
Meanwhile, board members had grown visibly frustrated with the lack of answers.
“We’ve asked time and time again for someone to let us know exactly what’s happening and no one is here to tell us that,” District 1 Board Member Myrna Molina said in an Executive Board meeting in early July.
Molina also questioned who has authority to sign contracts amid Hain’s continued absence.
Even when Johnson finally appeared before the board, alongside State’s Attorney Jamie Mosser, the joint presentation offered no dollar figure.
The two instead attributed the overruns to collective bargaining agreements, unfunded state mandates, staffing shortages and higher operating costs.
The financial questions have emerged alongside the unresolved questions over Hain’s ability to perform his duties, with county officials citing confidentiality and declining to provide details about his status.
Calls for reform
Amid the dysfunction the whistleblower made an explicit call to change department leadership through the ballot box.
“We need change within this department,” the whistleblower said. “Stop the corruption that’s going on. Stop the code of blue.”
The whistleblower said the toll of that culture shows up in morale.
“The overall morale is down, and that’s because of how the department is allowing it to continue to run,” they said.
“Officers have spoken up on multiple occasions, and nothing’s changing. Nothing’s being heard and nothing’s being changed.”
Describing the overall atmosphere inside the department, the whistleblower used a word that has now come up in accounts from multiple employees.
“It’s a toxic workplace,” the whistleblower said. “That’s how everybody is referring to this place. It’s toxic.”
Asked to characterize it further, the employee added simply, “Corrupted.”
