This scary character at the left is Treffly Coyne. She's got a mugshot on file somewhere, though we've never seen it. Oh, sure. She looks pleasant enough. But beware. Treffly Coyne is a wanton, dangerous criminal. No, seriously. Getta load o' this!!! Oh, believe me. This woman is a fiend... A FIENNDDDD, I tell you!On December 8, 2007, Treffly Coyne, mother of three in the Chicago suburb of Tinley Park, Illinois, was loading her youngest, Phoebe, age 2, in the carseat after a day of Christmas errands in nearby Crestwood, when the toddler fell promptly to sleep. Coyne's two older daughters and a little friend of theirs wanted to donate coins they'd collected for charity to a Salvation Army bell ringer standing on a curb, fewer than ten yards from Coyne's car.
It was sleeting, so Coyne decided to leave Phoebe in the warm, dry car. She turned on her emergency flashers, locked the car doors, activated the alarm, and walked the three little girls to the where the bell ringer stood. The car was NEVER out of her sight. She snapped a few photos of the girls making their donations (because she's obviously a hateful, uncaring, unloving mom), then walked back to the car. As she arrived there, a Crestwood police officer was waiting for her. The female officer -- who has yet to be named, but I can't wait to find out so I can make it public -- began yelling at Coyne that she was endangering her daughter and promptly told her she was being arrested, handcuffing her in full view of her two older children, who were standing on the curb in the sleeting rain. Immediately after hearing she was to be arrested, Coyne telephoned her husband, who (wisely, I think) told her to stay mum and not say a word until he arrived on the scene. Irritated that Coyne refused to speak with her further, including refusing to divulge Phoebe's name to either the officer or the child welfare worker, the cop added "obstructing a police officer" to the charge of "child endangerment." ("You have the right to remain silent....")
The officer called child welfare and had Phoebe taken into protective services -- did I mention that the three older girls were left standing in the sleeting rain -- STILL? Child welfare drove off with little Phoebe. And the three older girls were left standing in the sleeting rain. Still. Ignored by both the police officer and the child welfare worker (apparently, there's a cut-off in Illinois as to how old a child has to be before the city of Crestwood gives a crap. Once you hit three, kid, you're on your own!) Luckily, as the officer was shutting the back door of the squad car with the murderous, dangerous Treffly Coyne safely handcuffed in the back seat, her husband drove up. They were barely able to exchange a few words, when the female cop -- stalwartly protecting the safety of all children in Crestwood (in diapers, that is) -- drove away without a backward glance to make sure the three little girls she left standing in the sleeting rain had been claimed. Coyne's husband found them crying just outside the Wal-Mart. But I'm sure they were perfectly safe, now that they'd been freed from horrifying clutches of killer soccer mom Treffly Coyne by the heroic Crestwood peace officer. (Peace officer? Hmmm...)
This morning, Coyne was set to stand trial, where she faced one count each of child endangerment and obstructing a police officer. Had she been convicted, she could have served a year in prison and been forced to pay a $2500 fine. Instead, amazingly, the prosecutor dropped the charges, stating that his office could not meet the burden of proof that Coyne actually committed a crime.
Timothy Sulikowski, police chief for Crestwood, believed that the prosecutor made a huge mistake letting this hardened criminal go. Why, she'd brought it all on herself, he told reporters, by refusing to give the police officer her daughter's name. Had she simply given the officer Phoebe's name, Sulikowski said, there would never have been an arrest. There is some dispute on this, however, as Coyne claims her call to her husband -- in which he advised her to keep quiet --was a result of being told she was, in fact, being arrested, and she wanted to let him know (lest the remaining three children be left in the SLEETING RAIN! We just can't emphasize that point enough, can we?). It was only after that call that Coyne refused to speak to the arresting officer, so Sulikowski's story does not exactly jibe with both the officer's and Coyne's account of the arrest. "Still," according to CNN, "he claims that while police were obligated to report the case to the state’s child welfare agency, Coyne would not have been arrested had she cooperated and not refused to give them basic information, including the child’s name."
"'By not providing us with that information and the information of her child, at that point we don’t know that that child is hers. We don’t know if that child has been listed as a kidnapped child or a missing child,” he said. “Absolutely, she forced this.'”
Yes, we get it, Chief Sulikowski. I mean, just look at her. She looks like a hardened criminal. That low-slung brow -- those beady eyes -- that wide, slack jaw... Oh, wait... sorry... I was looking at a photo of Curly Howard from The Three Stooges. My bad....
In any case, we can all still see that it's suburban criminal scum like Coyne that really keep the Crestwood police department hopping on sleety, rainy nights when cruising a parking lot full of Volvos and mini-vans at Christmas time is way harder than, say, busting meth labs in downtown Chicago (I mean, those downtown cops have it cherry!). By the way, did she also force the part about your officer leaving her other children on the sidewalk, sobbing -- IN THE SLEETING RAIN? I guess your cop showed that witch Treffly Coyne, huh! Teach her to screw with the Crestwood PD! (Gee, I hope real criminals looking for a place where police presence is kind of soft don't read this.) I do find it interesting that, during initial interviews after Coyne's arrest, when it was pointed out that she had moved away from the car for a very brief time, Chief Sulikowski was quick to say, "A minute or two -- that's when things can happen." Seriously, Chief? It's too bad, then, that Officer Great-Big-Stick-Up-Her-Butt didn't get that memo when it came to the other three children she left as she sailed away, safe in the knowledge that she had just protected Crestwood from the next Bonnie Parker. You remember those kids, right, Chief? The ones you've absolutely failed to mention in EVERY SINGLE INTERVIEW YOU'VE GIVEN, as if they didn't exist -- kinda like your own officer, and the child welfare worker that night.
So, now that Coyne is out on the streets again, free to shop and take her kids to ballet class, Tinley Park can never quite feel safe again, knowing that any day now, she could move more than 30 feet from any of her children (though they're still within her sight), leaving them in the world unprotected and unattended. And then being sure that, should a police officer arrive on the scene, she might then commit the heinous act of refusing to speak to him or her. She's dangerous, I say, and she should be locked up. You know who else should be arrested? That Salvation Army bell ringer. I mean, do we even know who this guy was that lured Treffly Coyne into her infamous crime spree? I think this guy needs some investigating. It could be a ring -- a huge sindicate, where Salvation Army bell ringers lure the older children of suburban soccer moms into their dark web of coin donation, tempting them to leave their toddlers in warm, dry, locked, alarmed cars thirty feet away.
The prosecutor may have given up on this case, but I haven't! I'm determined to save Tinley Park from this frightening thug. It's not too late to rehabilitate Ms. Coyne from her flagrantly felonious life. I'll save you, Treffly. I'll save you and show you the error of your ways. By the way, next week, we'll be surgically attaching all three children to various parts of your body, so you can never be more than 20 to 30 centimeters from them at any given point in time. No need to thank me -- the future safety of your children and hapless citizens of suburban Chicago is thanks enough.
~C~
P.S. and totally off-point: Treffly Coyne gets this quarter's award for coolest name in a blog post subject.
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