Romeoville Man Wanted on Drug, Gun and Money Laundering Charges Surrenders

A Romeoville man on the run for more than a month turned himself in Thursday and was jailed on drug, gun and money laundering charges.

Richard Conley, 26, was taken into custody on separate cases investigated by the Romeoville and Joliet police. His total bond on all the charges was set at $475,000. Conley said he hoped his attorney, Paul Napolski, would be able to get the bond reduced at Friday court hearing.

Napolski succeeded in getting the bond for Conley’s girlfriend, 26-year-old Nancy Thang, lowered. Thang, who was also charged with money laundering, had a $250,000 bond that Napolski got down to $30,000 after her arrest. She posted the same day and was released from jail.

Conley claimed the police only sought the criminal case against his girlfriend after he refused to work for them as an informant.

“I’m not setting nobody up,” said Conley. “I’m not going to ruin nobody’s life for nothing.”

Conley said undercover cops pulled him over in September while he was driving with Thang and found about $12,000 in the vehicle. The law then searched his house and found cocaine and a pistol.

But instead of arresting him, Conley said, he was offered a deal to “set somebody up” and turned loose.

Conley said he strung the police along for about a month, telling them the man they wanted wasn’t returning his calls when he actually hadn’t reached out to him at all. But then the police ran out of patience.

“They said, ‘It’s over a month, (we) have nothing to show,’” he said. “That was a Wednesday. On Friday they got the warrants.”

And one of those warrants was for Thang.

“They knew I didn’t want anything to happen to her from the get-go,” Conley said. “They threw this s--- in on her because I wouldn’t help them.”

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