SYCAMORE – County officials said they could no longer trust an assistant state’s attorney who resigned Friday because he gave them false information about a case on which he represented them and made a dubious claim about his wife’s death.

John Farrell, who until Friday was the chief civil assistant in the state’s attorney’s office – and was state’s attorney himself from 2009 to 2010 – also used his wife’s illness as an excuse for the misinformation. He also told a county official that his wife had died in January, when voting records appear to show she voted in the March primary election.

“The purpose of this memorandum is to suggest that you arrange for the immediate replacement of John Farrell as civil counsel to the County of DeKalb,” DeKalb County Administrator Ray Bockman wrote in a letter to State’s Attorney Clay Campbell and County Board Chairman Larry Anderson dated Friday. “... This office can no longer maintain any level of confidence in his ability to represent the county’s interests in any capacity.”