Crest Hill Cop On Paid Leave Amid Channahon Death Probe

JOLIET, IL - Crest Hill Police Officer Felipe "Phil" Flores, 33, has been put on paid leave from police work as a result of Tuesday's death of his 23-year-old girlfriend Samantha Harer in Channahon. The 911 dispatcher in Will County was found dead inside her apartment in Channahon from a single gunshot wound. Flores was inside the apartment at the time of her shooting. Some of the residents at the Bridge Street Apartments say it was their understanding the dating couple lived together.

On Tuesday, the Channahon Police Department called in the Will County-Grundy County Major Crimes Task Force to investigate the circumstances of the young woman's death. Harer worked as a 911 dispatcher for WESCOM. She had graduated from the University of St. Francis in Joliet and was a familiar face at the Channahon Police Department because she had been a police intern there. WJOL Morning Show Host Scott Slocum, a Channahon resident, reported from the scene on Tuesday night relaying that police are treating Harer's death as an apparent suicide.

Bridge Street Apartments in Channahon, Tuesday night, Feb. 13.

On Wednesday afternoon, Crest Hill Police Chief Ed Clark told Joliet Patch during a phone interview that Flores is now on administrative leave "due to the tragedy that happened yesterday."

ORIGINAL STORY: Dead 911 Dispatcher Dated Crest Hill Cop

Clark said he was not able to give a time frame on how long Flores would stay on paid leave. Crest Hill employs 30 sworn police officers, he said. Flores typically works as a patrol officer. He has been on the Crest Hill police force for six years. He had been in the U.S. Marines, according to someone who knew him.

Clark said he has spoken with Flores since the death of the young woman. Channahon Police were notified of the shooting at 8:17 a.m. Tuesday. Harer was taken by ambulance and pronounced dead at St. Joe's hospital in Joliet. However, one of the Channahon apartment residents saw her being removed and said it looked like authorities already knew she was dead. Removing a dead body from any scene would, in theory, compromise the death scene investigation.

"It's just a sad, tragic situation," Clark said. The Crest Hill chief offered "prayers for the family and for people who worked with her." Clark said he did not know Harer personally and believed he had never met her before.

On Wednesday Patch learned that a woman who used to live in Crest Hill took out a protection order against the Crest Hill police officer on March 7, 2016. She accused Flores of raping her inside her bedroom on Feb. 6, 2016 after she went to sleep in her house. The protection order taken out by Kristen Kurtz, then 30, was granted by a Will County judge, extended one time, and later dismissed by a judge.

Kurtz told Joliet Patch that she was comfortable with having her name published in a story about Flores. Court documents state that Kurtz "filed a report on Phillip and the rape against me. Pictures were taken and bedding was taken from my home."

The Will County protection order was served against Flores in March 2016 at 1620 Plainfield Road, which is the Crest Hill Police Department where Flores worked the night shift, from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m., court documents reflect.

Kurtz told Patch on Wednesday that she did file a police report at the Crest Hill Police Department and that Flores was put on paid leave from the Crest Hill for about a year as her allegations of rape were under investigation. Kurtz said that Crest Hill Police turned the case over to the Will County Sheriff's Department. Eventually, she got a phone call from a representative of Will County State's Attorney James Glasgow, telling her that a decision had been made not to bring criminal charges against Flores.

Kurtz said she was told that prosecutors did not feel there was at least an 80 percent chance of success if they filed criminal charges against Flores. They told her the fact that she and Flores had previously been friends worked against her in trying to obtain a conviction, she said.

Patch asked Chief Clark about the 2016 protection order and rape allegations against Flores. He said that any criminal complaints lodged against an active-duty officer are handled by a "third-party" agency. When asked if the Will County Sheriff's Department was brought in to handle the rape allegations against Flores, Clark would not comment, saying that was a personnel issue.

However, on Wednesday night, Will County Sheriff's Department Chief Deputy Sheriff Dan Jungles told Patch that Will County Sheriff's Police was definitely not the outside police agency that had handled the 2016 allegation against the Crest Hill police officer.

Meanwhile, when asked how long Flores was put on paid leave regarding the 2016 protection order case, Clark declined to comment, saying that was also a personnel issue.

Patch asked Clark if he knew which way the death investigation was leaning, suicide or murder. He stressed that his agency is not part of the ongoing investigation surrounding the Channahon woman's death.

"Obviously, we don't have any comment," he said. "I know they are working very diligently on it ... I am going to let them (run) their investigation."

On Wednesday evening, at supper, Will County Coroner Patrick O'Neil updated the press hotline. He announced that Harer had died as a result of a single gunshot wound. Her autopsy was performed on Wednesday. However, O'Neil indicated that the cause and manner of death was still open and needed additional information from the police investigation as well as toxicology lab results.

Main image via Google Maps, secondary image via Patch Editor John Ferak