Editor’s Note: In reporting on individuals who have experienced trauma, The Daily Egyptian remains consistent with best journalistic standards that allow for victims to choose anonymity. The woman in this story is deceased, so the DE has elected not to name her nor her family. 

This story includes discussion of suicide. If you or someone you know needs help, the national suicide and crisis lifeline in the U.S. is available by calling or texting 988. There is also an online chat at 988lifeline.org.

A southern Illinois police chief admitted he shared a photograph with other people and he shouldn’t have done it, village records show. Months later, there is no evidence the village has conducted an investigation it had publicly voted to approve.

In Cambria, a Williamson County town of about 1,500 people, allegations that the police chief showed village employees a photo of a nude woman have fractured local leadership, prompted resignations and drawn scrutiny over whether officials are withholding public records tied to the case.

Records, interviews and public comments in Cambria Village Board meetings show conflicting accounts of how the image was taken and shared — and raise broader questions about transparency, accountability and whether local officials followed Illinois public records law as scrutiny intensified.

A call, a photo and conflicting accounts

Williamson County Sheriff’s Office records show that on Oct. 16, 2025, Cambria Police Chief Phillip Boss responded to a call involving a woman who was naked in her neighbor’s vehicle. Two additional Williamson County law enforcement agencies also responded. The woman was subsequently taken by ambulance to Herrin Hospital.

At some point, a photograph was taken of the woman while she was naked, according to interviews. It remains unclear who took the photo, how it was transmitted or whether Boss obtained it as part of official police activity. 

Accounts from village officials and others conflict.

In an interview with the DE, Cambria Village Board Trustee Mike Ren said that he was told the image was taken by another officer and sent to Boss’ village-issued phone. Kacie Heggemeier, Boss’ daughter, said in a Feb. 3 village board meeting, a recording of which was provided to the DE, that the image was sent to that same device. Trustee Robin McFarlin said in an interview with the DE that she heard the image was taken by the woman’s neighbor and sent to Boss’ personal phone.

None of those accounts have been confirmed through the limited amount of records released by the village. The neighbor who reported the incident could not be reached in response to phone calls, social media messages and two visits to their home. Heggemeier told the DE she did not want to comment. 

Village trustees Mark Phillips and Suzzette Coffey declined to comment for this story. Trustee Robbie Chitwood did not respond to multiple calls seeking comment.

Before the Village Board voted to task its attorney, Webb Smith, to investigate the matter, Boss acknowledged showing an image to others, according to Jan. 6 meeting minutes. 

“I think I know what this is about and it’s about the photograph and I realize I shouldn’t have shown it to the others,” the chief told the board, according to the meeting minutes, before they voted to investigate. The meeting minutes do not describe the contents of “the photograph” Boss referred to. 

In a March 31 phone call with the DE, he denied the allegations against him.

“It’s all false,” he said, adding that he was being retaliated against for disciplinary action he took against a police officer in the department. 

The chief would not elaborate further.

An investigation yet to materialize

In his statement to the DE, Trustee Marshall Brown said that he learned of the alleged incident last December and moved at the board’s January meeting that the village attorney investigate Boss’ alleged actions. According to meeting minutes, Brown, Coffey and McFarlin voted to approve the investigation, while trustees Mike Ren and Robby Chitwood voted against it. Trustee Mark Phillips was absent from the meeting.

Despite the board’s move to investigate Boss, Brown and McFarlin told the DE that the investigation has not taken place.

“I made a motion requesting that the matter be investigated. The motion passed,” Brown wrote in a statement to the DE. “However, to my knowledge, that investigation was never conducted.”

Both Brown and Ren told the DE that Boss showed the photograph of the woman to former Village Clerk Alisa Modglin.

“According to Alisa, … Cambria police had been conducting a wellness check on the woman depicted in the image,” Brown wrote in his statement. “She did not tell me who had taken the photograph, only that the village employee had shared the image with her and (water superintendent) Bruce Hagler.”

Modglin and Hagler refused to comment for this story. Trustees Brown, Ren and McFarlin said in interviews that, in addition to the village clerk and water superintendent, the image was also shown to Fire Chief Randy Simmons, who also declined to comment on the incident.

Smith, the village attorney, declined to say whether or not any investigation into the chief has been conducted. 

Since the vote and as of publication, the village has not released any findings or reports, nor have they produced any records detailing any sort of investigation to the DE, despite several Freedom of Information Act requests. 

The woman at the center

By the time the board voted to investigate Boss in early January, the woman in the alleged photograph was dead.

According to Franklin County Coroner Marty Leffler, the woman had died by suicide on Dec. 12 — roughly two months after the October call that Boss responded to. There have been no findings suggesting that the October incident or the alleged photograph contributed in any way to the suicide.

The DE spoke with the woman’s mother and her partner. The two said they were unaware that a nude photograph had allegedly been taken or shared of the woman. 

The woman’s mother said she heard of an incident in Cambria last October, but was unaware of the details, and said her daughter had struggled with mental health and substance abuse.

The situation was jarring for her yearslong partner.

“I am kinda shocked,” he said. “You wouldn’t think somebody at that high of a level in law enforcement would do something like that.”

The woman and her partner had been together since 2017. He described her as warm and caring — someone who loved spending time with her young children and browsing thrift stores.

“She was very warm-hearted,” he said. “Very caring, very loving.”

For now, the woman’s partner said he has to wait and see what happens.

“Take it one day at a time,” he said. “ Keep breathing, keep praying.”

Records requests provide few answers

The Daily Egyptian in February and March filed four Freedom of Information Act requests with the village seeking records tied to the October incident, the photograph and the supposed investigation.

Other than Jan. 6 meeting minutes and a brief email from Boss to the DE, the village contends there are no records — including photographs, police records, official memos, emails, texts or other written communication — surrounding the controversy. 

In a statement following one FOIA request, Boss wrote that no criminal complaint had been filed and that Cambria police “only assisted” on the call. Boss’ statement was provided to the DE in an email the village clerk sent to the newspaper. 

The DE obtained a Cambria Police Department case log confirming Boss responded to the Oct. 16 call — a record that was not included in the village’s FOIA responses.

Call sheets from other agencies show multiple departments responded, and the existence of a case log suggests at least some internal documentation was created, which the chief denied.

A request for records documenting searches to locate correspondence related to the DE’s three prior FOIA requests yielded one responsive record. 

“The attached email is the only record we have documenting the search,” Alisa Modglin wrote. The attached document was the previous statement from Boss, but no other correspondence or evidence of searches. McFarlin and Brown told the DE they were never asked to provide the village with any records.

The DE asked the Illinois Attorney General’s Public Access Counselor to review the Village of Cambria’s Freedom of Information Act responses last month. The PAC has assigned an attorney to the request, but it is unclear when the review board will issue an opinion.

Leadership’s fallout and a divided town

Village board meetings that would previously only garner a handful of residents in the community’s board room have now been moved to the larger cafeteria, at times devolving into chaos from wall to wall. Trustees described meetings as toxic and divided, with disputes spilling beyond the allegations themselves into conflicts over residency, past conduct and political loyalties. 

Some residents and community leaders have rallied behind the chief, urging trustees who supported the investigation to step down.

Former Trustee Christine Dakin in the March 3 village board meeting called into question Trustee McFarlin because of a situation a decade ago in which funds for community works were not properly recorded. McFarlin produced a letter from the Williamson County State’s Attorney stating that the funds were accounted for.

Heggemeier, Boss’ daughter, in the March 3 meeting called Brown’s residency and ability to serve on the village board into question based on a county geographic survey. David Brown, the trustee’s father, said in a March 18 special meeting he annexed the property into Cambria by village ordinance in 1996 and served on the municipality’s board for several years after.  

McFarlin told the DE that after entering executive session during the board’s Feb. 3 meeting, many attendees of the meeting were banging on windows and doors in an attempt to disrupt or intimidate board members. The board had entered executive session to discuss personnel matters, according to the meeting minutes. 

The vote to retain or fire Boss ended in a tie. Village President Ron Modglin cast the tie-breaking vote weeks before his resignation, resulting in Boss being retained. Trustees Brown, Coffey and McFarlin voted in favor of the measure, while Ren, Chitwood and Phillips voted against it.

Following the meeting in which Brown moved that the village terminate Boss, he wrote in a Facebook post that he had a responsibility to act in the best interest of the community.

“I will always choose accountability and the well-being of our residents over local politics,” he wrote.

Hours after the DE filed its first FOIA request into the Boss allegations on Feb. 27, Village President Ron Modglin resigned, citing health concerns. Village Clerk Alisa Modglin, his wife, resigned the same day, though she remains employed in the village’s water department.

Trustee Suzzette Coffey also quit on Feb. 4 following the vote to fire Boss, but later discovered her signature wasn’t notarized on her resignation letter, so she decided to return to the board on March 18.

The controversies have left the board on edge. Trustee Ren said the meetings have generally devolved from discussing items around maintenance to the allegation made against the police chief.

As for Boss’ claims that he is being retaliated against for personnel disciplinary decisions, the village’s meeting minutes show that in January and February, the same trustees who separately voted to suspend without pay the subordinate Boss had disciplined are the same ones who voted to investigate and terminate him.

Ren said he voted no on both the investigation and the subsequent move to fire the chief because everyone makes mistakes.

“He has been our police chief for a long time,” Ren said. “He does a good job. I don’t see firing a guy over making a mistake like that.” 

Still, he said that Boss “should not have shown it to anybody.”

As of publication, the Village of Cambria has not taken any disciplinary action against the police chief. Instead, the board voted during a March 18 special meeting to approve additional pay for Boss to cover overtime work, despite being a salaried employee. 

Brown was the only trustee who voted against the measure.

As of publication, Cambria remains without a village president. The board at its April 7 meeting failed to select a replacement as applications for the position had not been given to the trustees to review before the meeting.

Guest speakers Jody Bailey and Scott Pelegrino, both Cambria residents, voiced their frustrations with the board of trustees. Bailey said she wanted “more transparency,” and Pelegrino said he wanted “answers.”

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to clarify a statement Christine Dakin made in a March 3 Village Board meeting. An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated McFarlin produced a letter from the Illinois Attorney General stating that the funds were accounted for. That letter was from the Williamson County State’s Attorney.

Staff Reporter Brayden Guy can be reached at [email protected]

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