Fake Lawyer Represents Himself Unsuccessfully In Marathon Hearing

WAUKEGAN, IL — An admitted identity thief and fake attorney facing charges in Illinois and Florida unsuccessfully represented himself in a probation violation hearing that took more than six weeks to complete. After John Ryan, 35, rejected a plea deal, a Lake County judge found him guilty of failure to report to his probation officer, and he now faces several years in state prison as well as pending felony charges in Cook County and Miami-Dade County.

Ryan, who has past addresses listed in Chicago, Evanston, Lockport, Mount Prospect and Skokie, would have been due to complete his probation this month following his May 2017 guilty plea to one count of identity theft. Instead, he is due to be sentenced in January before becoming eligible to face charges in other jurisdictions.

Prosecutors had agreed to drop additional counts related to thousands of dollars in bills he allegedly racked up at Deerfield hotels, pretending to be a U.S. Senate candidate and attorney while dodging a warrant for his arrest from Wisconsin, where he was wanted for violating the terms of his probation resulting from a conviction for escaping arrest.

Ryan was shipped off to Dodge Correctional Institution in Waupun, Wisconsin, with instructions to report back to Waukegan as soon as he was released, according to testimony at his probation violation hearing. He was released Aug. 18, 2018. Instead of serving his probation and setting up a payment plan for the restitution he owed, Ryan headed to south Florida within a few months and established a new fake law firm called Harding & Pierce, Patch reported earlier this year.

Past Illinois ventures Ryan has founded or operated include a law firm called Berkshire & Ross and moving companies named MoveWire, U.S. Logistics and Allied North America, according to police reports and state records. His companies faced allegations he would collect payment upfront and never deliver items or render services — or pilfer settlement money when he was seemingly able to convince insurance companies he was an actual attorney. One client who hired him as a lawyer to collect unpaid debts to a construction company told investigators Ryan had managed to successfully collect nine of 10 debts but became suspicious when he failed to perform a simple contract agreement. His business model usually involved an answering service, shared office space and plenty of puffery.

"People are afforded a lot of protections behind a corporation," Ryan told Patch earlier this year, after he was presented with some of the allegations against him, telling a reporter his firm had "quite a few" lawyers. The fictional firm claimed to have offices in Miami, Chicago, New York City, Honolulu, Los Angeles, Houston and Mississippi. It purported to be "actively changing the landscape of litigation in America and, to a greater extent, redefining the scope of the Attorney-Client relationship," according to its website, which was taken offline following the publication of a May 2019 Patch report.

Later that month, Naperville police got a call from the Mercedes Benz dealership at 1569 W. Ogden Ave. after Ryan tried to purchase a car, according to police reports. Staff reportedly called police after he tried to pay in cash and an online search turned up his long history of arrests.

At the time, Ryan was wanted in Illinois on non-extraditable warrants from Deerfield, Rosemont and the Lake County sheriff's office. It is not clear why he returned to the state. In June, a Cook County grand jury indicted him on one count of false personation of an attorney "for purposes of compensation or consideration," a class 4 felony with a maximum sentence of three years in prison, in connection with his activities in early 2017. Prosecutors in Miami also charged him with organized fraud, third degree grand theft and practicing law without a license and sought his extradition.

He would soon get a chance to practice law in a real courtroom for the first time.

Lake County Circuit Judge Patricia Fix presided over a four-part hearing on a petition by prosecutors to revoke Ryan's probation, which they filed in December 2018 after learning Ryan never showed up after his release from jail in Wisconsin.

Ryan was initially represented in the process by public defender Jeff Facklam, who received an plea offer of four years in prison. That would have amounted to about 19 and a half months in prison for Ryan, counting time served and good behavior. But the unlicensed lawyer decided to dismiss the offer and his court-appointed attorney just as his probation violation hearing began on Oct. 1.

"I see that there is apparently some offense of performing law without a license," Fix told Ryan. "Be that as it may, you are legally allowed to represent yourself, pro se, if that's what you'd like to do."

Before allowing Ryan to waive his right to counsel, Fix asked Ryan a series of questions. Ryan told her he dropped out of college in Wisconsin after about a year and a half of studying media business management. Ryan admitted he never went to law school.

Fix warned him Assistant State's Attorney Danielle Pascucci, who would be soon begin prosecuting what she described as the the longest hearing on a petition to revoke probation in her career, had more than 20 years of experience. She had earlier gotten Facklam to explain he had taken part in more than 1,000 such probation hearings in his 13 years of experience in criminal defense.

"They both have law degrees — you don't," Fix told Ryan. "Even though you have had contact in various legal proceedings, the fact that you are unfamiliar with representing yourself in a criminal case puts you at a disadvantage."

The judge allowed Ryan to act as his own attorney and gave him about an hour to prepare for the hearing, rejecting his requests for more time.

"That's not the way it goes, Mr. Ryan," Fix said, reminding him he had months to prepare for the proceedings.

Later that day, Pascucci called her only two witnesses — Tina Johnston, a 30-year veteran of the Lake County Adult Probation Services division, and Stephanie Erickson, a court clerk.

Johnston testified she went over the details of the probation agreement Ryan had signed before his release from Lake County Jail. Erickson explained the clerk's records showed the only restitution Ryan ever paid of the $8,500 he owed to the Residence Inn was the nearly $2,300 in cash that Deerfield police confiscated at the time of his arrest.

Ryan objected repeatedly during the proceedings, and Fix sustained them on a few occasions. His cross-examinations focused mainly on the fact that he was not properly provided a paper copy of the requirements of his probation, and that the deadline for payment of restitution had not yet passed when prosecutors petitioned to revoke his probation. Ryan asked Johnston if "the defendant" had ever been given a schedule for paying back the money owed. She pointed out he never showed up to establish one.

"You and I would have gone over a payment plan once you came to my office," Johnston told him.

After Pascucci rested her case, which only needed to be proven to the "preponderance of evidence standard" of 51 percent, Ryan announced he wanted to call as witnesses his former public defender, two corrections officers assigned to the Lake County Jail and a woman who lived at his last known address.

Ryan argued their testimony would show that he was never mailed instructions to fulfill the terms of his testimony and that the sheriff's office had destroyed them. He suggested his lawyer could testify that he had offered to pay restitution. Over Pascucci's objections — "I do not know what he has done, if anything, to prepare for this today," the prosecutor said, arguing Ryan's failure to adequately prepare was not a good enough reason for further delays — Fix allowed for the hearing to be continued until a little over two weeks later.

Meanwhile, Ryan began drawing up subpoenas and a handwritten motion seeking to dismiss the case. It arguing that he had not "willfully" violated the terms of his probation and had never been tendered full instructions on how to comply.

"It is clear that Ms. Johnston breached her oath to the court and her duty to Ryan by failing to tender the statutorily required terms of Ryan's release on probation," Ryan argued. "If this court were to revoke Ryan's probation, the revocation would manifest a scenario under which probation officers would no longer need to abide by the laws which govern their duties and oath to this court, under which probationers would be governed by unknown terms and conditions and, ultimately, subject to revocation for failing to adhere to the unknown."

On Oct. 17, the second day of the hearing, Ryan filed his motion and told the judge it would violate an "unbroken and unabrogated line of cases" if he were to have found to violate his probation. He said he had been unable to file necessary subpoenas from within the jail, where he had no access to internet and little access to the law library. The judge asked about the jail's iPad program and was told they do not connect to the internet or the clerk's website. Fix then granted a motion to issue subpoenas and set a date for the hearing to continue in about three weeks.

When the parties reconvened on the afternoon of Nov. 13, Ryan explained he had been unable to serve the subpoenas since no one from the Lake County sheriff's office would accept them. He also said he had filed a grievance with a sergeant about how long it takes to mail things from the jail. Fix ordered for his subpoenas to be issued, allowing Ryan to call for testimony from two corrections officers and the Skokie woman who he said had been forwarding his mail before hearing arguments from both sides on his motion to dismiss.

Ryan contended the "state's allegation was prematurely submitted" and "effectively rendered moot." He maintained the legal burden to direct him to report to probation services was on the probation officer, not him, and that "every probationer throughout the history of Lake County jurisprudence" has had a chance to get a copy of the terms of their probation.

Pascucci, arguing at times during the extended hearings while leaning back in her chair with her eyes closed, pointed out Ryan's probation officer, Johnston, had gone above and beyond her duties by checking in with Wisconsin prison authorities and attempting to send a letter to Ryan's last known address to remind him to check in. That letter was later returned undelivered, the probation officer testified.

Fix denied Ryan's motion to dismiss the case and continued the hearing to its fourth day, again over Pascucci's objections, who questioned what relevance any of the witnesses Ryan wanted to call had.

"The defendant has not provided any information that any of these witnesses would state anything that would aid in his defense," the prosecutor said. "He was aware of his obligations ... whether or not he received copies — not relevant."

Related:
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The hearing headed into its fourth and final day Tuesday. Lake County sheriff's corrections officers Peter Grzeda and Raheem Murphy were on hand. Both officers testified they did not destroy any of Ryan's court paperwork.

"I just put all your paperwork with your property," Grzeda told Ryan. "I don't know what happened to it."

Murphy said the sheriff's office's procedure for items left behind by detainees was to hold it until further notice. Ryan asked him when property left behind gets destroyed, if ever.

"It's above my pay grade," Murphy testified.

After the officers — who both received two hours overtime pay courtesy of the fake lawyer’s subpoenas — testified, Ryan recalled Johnston to the stand for further questioning. He asked if she had ever failed to tender written instructions to any other people on probation.

"I did not tender anything to you because you did not report to my office as directed," Johnston testified. The two had only met once, with glass between them at Lake County Jail. She testified she went through each clause with Ryan.

"Did you expect the defendant to remember," all the details of his probation order, Ryan asked.

"I expected you, being on probation, to know you're on probation and to report to your probation officer," Johnson said.

During closing arguments, Pascucci emphasized Ryan never made any attempt to pay restitution or to abide by the terms of his probation following his release from prison. It did not matter, she argued, whether the probation instructions were transported with him to Wisconsin.

"But there was no testimony it wasn't brought," she said, "or that the defendant has some mental illness that would cause him to forget he's on probation."

In his closing argument, Ryan said the state had failed "woefully" to prove a willful violation of probation. The burden of providing instructions and directions was on the probation officer, he said, asking for his probation to be reinstated.

"A simple mailing to [Dodge Correctional Institution] would have mooted any argument" that he was not properly notified, Ryan contended. He argued that the allegations that he failed to report to his probation officer from September 2018 to December 2018, when prosecutors filed the petition to revoke his probation, were invalid — since it was actually in August when he failed to report.

"Had the state alleged that the defendant didn't report in August," he said. "Maybe there would be some legal or factual traction there."

The judge disagreed.

"The probation department did not move. We're all still here in Waukegan, Illinois, and the burden was on you," Fix said. She cited "unrebutted" evidence that Ryan knew he was on probation and never made any effort to contact Lake County authorities about it. She then found him guilty of failing to report to his probation officer by a preponderance of evidence.

"I'm not even going to address the willfulness," when it comes to allegation he failed to make restitution payments, Fix said.

She ordered Ryan to remain held at Lake County Jail in lieu of a $100,000 cash portion of his bond ahead of a Jan. 16 sentencing hearing. It's likely he will face no more than 6 months of additional prison time as a result of his decision to reject the plea offer and represent himself through the multi-part hearing.

With outstanding warrants from Rosemont and Miami, it is not clear where Ryan may face charges next. The other jurisdictions will have to "get in different parts of the line," Fix said.