From the State’s Attorney:
COURT GRANTS STATE’S ATTORNEY’S OFFICE’S PETITION TO DETAIN MAN ACCUSED OF POSSESSION OF CHILD PORNOGRAPHY
McHenry County State’s Attorney Randi Freese announced today that the Honorable Judge Cynthia Lamb granted the State’s motion to deny pretrial release for James R. Gibbons, 72, of Marengo, Illinois.
Gibbons appeared in Initial Appearance Court on December 19, 2025, charged with two counts of Possession of Child Pornography, Class 2 felonies.
Evidence was presented in court this afternoon that a cyber tip from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children was forwarded for investigation to the McHenry County Sheriff’s Office for possible child sexual abuse material.
Detectives’ investigative efforts led them to an IP address associated with Gibbons’s address in Marengo.
Law enforcement obtained a search warrant for Gibbons’s address and located devices containing child sexual abuse material.
During the hearing on the State’s Petition to Deny Pre-trial Release, Judge Lamb found that there were no conditions or combinations of conditions that the court could impose to keep the community safe based on dangerousness.
State’s Attorney Freese commends the detectives from the McHenry County Sheriff’s Office for the thorough investigation that led to these charges.
She also thanks Criminal Division Deputy Chief Margaret O’Brien, who assisted law enforcement with the investigation, and Assistant State’s Attorney Sawyer Schexnider, who successfully argued the motion to deny Gibbons’s pretrial release in Initial Appearance Court.
Gibbons’s next court appearance is scheduled for December 26, 2025, in courtroom 304.
Members of the public are reminded that this complaint contains only charges and is not proof of the defendant’s guilt. A defendant is presumed innocent and is entitled to a fair trial in which it is the government’s burden to prove his or her guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
