CHICAGO — A Chicago commuter who illegally used a cellphone jammer on a transit train to keep his rides quieter was placed in a diversion program Thursday that could allow him to avoid a conviction.
An attorney for Dennis Nicholl, 63, who made national headlines after his arrest, said the arrangement requires his client to attend counseling sessions.
Cook County prosecutors said in court that if Nicholl completes all the requirements of the diversion program they will dismiss the misdemeanor charge against him on his next court date in late June.
Prosecutors originally charged Nicholl with felony unlawful interference with a public utility but later reduced the charge to a misdemeanor count of tampering with communication services.
Nicholl’s attorney Charles Lauer said prosecutors discovered the original charge didn’t apply since cellphone towers are not a public utility. When they charged Nicholl under a state statute that deals with public airwaves, the circumstances rose only to the level of a misdemeanor, Lauer said.
Lauer has previously said Nicholl, a certified public accountant, wanted only some peace and quiet on his commute from his North Side home to the University of Illinois Hospital &Health Sciences System, where officials confirmed he works as a financial analyst.
“He’s disturbed by people talking around him,” Lauer said after a judge set bail at $10,000 earlier this month while dubbing Nicholl “the cellphone police.” “He might have been selfish in thinking about himself, but he didn’t have any malicious intent.”
Photos of Nicholl holding the jamming device on Chicago Transit Authority trains had circulated online for months. Chicago police had been tipped to the individual months ago and had obtained his photo.
Armed with a photograph taken by a CTA passenger of the suspect holding in his hand what appeared to be a black electronic device, an undercover “mission team” made up of officers from the Police Department and the Federal Communications Commission set up at the Loyola stop on the CTA Red Line at 6 a.m. on March 8.
A little more than an hour later, an undercover officer saw Nicholl enter the Loyola station and followed him onto a Red Line train. The plainclothes officer situated himself near Nicholl and immediately made a call on his personal cellphone, according to the arrest report.
The officer saw Nicholl remove a black electronic device with multiple antennas from his pocket and push a button on it, police said. The officer immediately lost his signal and the call dropped, police said.
After the train stopped at the Granville platform, Nicholl was taken into custody by officers. He was holding the jamming device in his hand, police said.
Nicholl admitted using the jamming device because “he gets annoyed at people talking on their cell phones while riding on the CTA,” the arrest report said.
This is not the first time Nicholl has been charged with jamming cell calls. He pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge in June 2009, according to court records. He was placed under court supervision for a year, and his equipment was confiscated and destroyed.
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