Sister: Seeing Woodridge Ex-Cop Again After His Disappearance Was 'Very Emotional'

A Woodridge ex-cop is innocent, his sister insists.

“It’s something he’s told me over and over again,” Dawn Ferralez said. “It’s something that I truly believe in my heart.”

Scott Webb, of Romeoville, is charged with taking $30,000 from Crawlin' for the Fallen fundraisers, a bar crawl he helped organize to benefit C.O.P.S. (Concerns of Police Survivors). The organization benefits family members of police officers killed in the line of duty. 

 on two counts of theft and was sought on a $250,000 bail arrest warrant. He disappeared and never contacted his family. 

Following a five-month search, Webb was arrested Oct. 18 in his home in Branson, MO, after police received a tip as to his whereabouts. He has agreed to return to Illinois and will appear in a bond hearing Wednesday morning. 

Ferralez went to Missouri this weekend to see her brother for the first time since he disappeared. The experience was "emotional," she said. "Very, very emotional." 

"There are mixed emotions –- relief that he’s okay but then worry about what’s yet to come," Ferralez said. "We don’t even know what to expect. We've never had to deal with a situation like this in the family."

Scott is her best friend, she said. Not being able to talk to him for the past five months was agony.

“I knew I could always pick up the phone and call Scott,” she said. “It made me feel better no matter what was going on. If I was having a bad day, I’d just call to hear his voice. Not being able to do that, not knowing if he was alive or dead, it was a scary feeling.

"Having to explain to my children why Uncle Scott wasn’t around -- having U.S. Marshalls show up at my door with guns and bullet-proof vests -- was scary for them.”

Webb didn’t contact her for her protection, she said. He didn’t want her to get into trouble. 

The idea of being taken to jail to stay with those he had helped put away was terrifying for Webb, she said. Now the reality is moreso. 

"He's not thrilled to be sitting (in jail) with a bunch of criminals," she said. 

DuPage County State's Attorney Spokesman Paul Darrah said in May the thefts from C.O.P.S. occurred between June 2007 and August 2010, totaling $30,000. 

Ferralez insists her brother wouldn't take money from a charity he started. 

“He lived for it,” she said. “When one would end in February, he would start planning the next one.”

Helping the families of slain officers is a cause close to her family's heart, she said. Her father, also a cop, lost his partner on the job. 

Their father continues to be a big influence in their lives, she said. Webb became a police officer because he looked up to this father, Ferralez said. 

And she said their father has had one lesson he has instilled in his children more than any other: 

“The two worst things is a liar and a thief,” she said. “He branded that into us when we were little. You don’t lie and you don’t steal.”

Ferralez said she hasn't spoken with her brother too deeply about what could have happened to the money, though Webb told her he had mailed the money to the charity, she said.

Some parts of the case against her brother don't make sense, she said. 

"Not a single one of the checks was ever cashed," she said. "That money is not missing. Those people are not out of their money"

There had also been a drop-off in participation in the most recent Crawlin' for the Fallen event, she said.

"Last year they had only three buses of people attending when there had been eight or nine buses in the past," she said. "There's no way it was even close to ($30,000)...the dollar amount doesn't add up."