Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart has served one of his department’s correctional officers with a defamation lawsuit, saying the Cook County Sheriff’s Office employee and his wife were behind emails sent last year, asserting the sheriff had abused his wife and was covering it up.
On Sept. 20, Dart filed suit in Cook County Circuit Court against correctional officer Howard Denham, his wife, Nicole Denham, and Nicole Denham’s employer, asserting they should all pay damages of at least $50,000 for their roles in spreading the unfounded rumors accusing Dart of domestic violence.
In 2017, the lawsuit says, the Denhams authored and emailed at least three messages to a number of people, including those working in local news organizations, asserting Dart had “physically attacked his wife causing visible injuries to her face” in their home in Chicago’s Mt. Greenwood neighborhood, and claiming the alleged injuries had been observed and documented by Chicago Police officers and Cook County Sheriff’s Police.
Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart
The emails asserted “there was a police report pertaining to this incident where it states ‘Offender Unknown.’”
One of the emails accused Dart of being involved in an alleged “extra-marital affair”
The emails further claimed Dart was “involved in this cover up” of the alleged incidents to keep them out of the public eye.
Dart denied the allegations, and in his lawsuit, asserts the “statements were false or authored with a reckless disregard for their truth and falsity.”
Earlier this year, Dart secured a court order allowing him to subpoena records from Yahoo revealing the IP address of the person who sent the emails.
The lawsuit asserts the emails were sent through Nicole Denham’s employer, Paper Source Inc., a stationery shop in Chicago.
The lawsuit does not offer any indication of what motivated the Denhams to allegedly send the alleged defamatory emails.
However, a report published in the Chicago Sun-Times indicates Howard Denham is a political supporter of a potential Republican challenger to Dart.
Dart is represented in the action by attorneys Winters Salzetta O’Brien & Richardson LLC, of Chicago.