Joliet Reporter Facing Fed Child Porn Rap Banged Head in Jail Van, Will Get Competency Eval

A psychologist will determine whether a Joliet weekly newspaper reporter is mentally competent to face federal child pornography charges.

The competency evaluation was prompted by John Gabriel, 77, getting knocked unconscious when he banged his head in a prisoner transport van.

Gabriel was riding from the Kankakee County jail to federal court in Chicago when the driver made an "abrupt right turn," he wrote in a letter to a federal judge in October. Since then, Gabriel said in the letter, he vomits when he attempts to eat, his back, neck and head "hurt terribly," he has suffered from dizzy spells, blacked out, and has fallen and hit his head again.

Federal Judge John J. Tharp ordered Gabriel's evaluation last week.

Gabriel's attorney, MiAngel Cody, expressed her concern for him in an email to Deputy U.S. Marshal William Kaulfers.

"He tells me he has requested medical attention at the jail and his requests have been ignored," Cody said of Gabriel. "I am really concerned about him, especially because he is 77 years old and reports that he is in a great deal of pain."

Kaulfers wrote back that Gabriel "had a CT scan while at the ER and it was ruled negative for any injury."

"Because he is still complaining they are sending him for a second scan," Kaulfers wrote. "They did put him on some new medication recently for something to do with one side of his body. From what was relayed to me it sounds like they are caring for his medical needs."

Gabriel was arrested on a charge of manufacturing child pornography in September. He "enticed" a girl "to engage in sexually explicit conduct" so he could "produce a visual depiction" of it, according to an indictment unsealed after his arrest.

Around the same time Gabriel was allegedly manufacturing child pornography, his live-in girlfriend, 34-year-old Margarita Hernandez, was orchestrating and consummating a sex date with a 15year-old boy, police said.

The youth is a friend of the son of one of Hernandez's cousins, officials said. Gabriel was home with Hernandez at the time of the alleged sex romp, police said.

Hernandez's case remains pending in Will County court.

In the wake of Hernandez's arrest, Gabriel defended his girlfriend against the allegations and said she was merely a pawn targeted by the many enemies he made during his career as a weekly newspaper reporter.

"This thing with Margarita is nothing more than an adventure in hate," Gabriel said at the time.

"This is all a setup," he said, noting that the frame job was easy to spot, "If you remember how some of the people reacted when I went after some of the crooked policemen and crooked politicians."

In his letter to the judge about his head injury, Gabriel claimed to have the evidence that will clear him in files at his Joliet home.

"I have sound, valid evidence that will clear me, in my business files, publications and other records, all of which are in my home," he wrote. "I am in custody far from contact with my attorney and I have been unable to reach her by phone except for once; only briefly."

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