A 30-year-old Aurora man has been sentenced to 10 years in prison after holding his girlfriend against her will for a week inside his trailer at a Marengo RV resort, strangling her and threatening to shoot her with a shotgun he kept pressed to her head. Stephen A. Dracousis pleaded guilty to aggravated kidnapping, a Class X felony, in connection with the ordeal that unfolded between November 2 and November 8, 2024, at Lehman’s Lakeside RV Resort.
The case, first reported by Shaw Local, detailed how Dracousis was already on pretrial release for an aggravated domestic battery charge out of DeKalb County involving the same woman, and had been explicitly prohibited from contacting her or possessing firearms and ammunition at the time he took her captive. The 65-acre resort, which sits off Interstate 90 near the Hampshire exit along Harmony Road in unincorporated Marengo, offers more than 295 campsites and an eight-acre lake, according to Lehman’s Lakeside RV Resort.
A Strangling That Started It All
According to Shaw Local’s account of court records, the ordeal began on November 2, 2024, when Dracousis choked the woman until she could not breathe; she later told investigators she thought she was going to die. Per a court motion cited by the outlet, she was left bruised, and the Daily Herald reported that Assistant McHenry County State’s Attorney Anthony Marin said the choking caused her to cough and vomit, with emergency room staff later treating chest bruises. Dracousis denied any physical altercation had occurred, per the same court motion.
For the following days, the woman told her mother on November 7 that she did not feel free to leave the trailer because Dracousis had access to a firearm, according to Shaw Local’s reporting. She later said Dracousis was armed at all times and threatened to kill her and himself if she tried to leave. Court motions detailed by the Daily Herald described Dracousis placing the shotgun against her head and putting the barrel in his own mouth while threatening to kill them both.
Police Left the Scene, Then Came Back
McHenry County Sheriff’s deputies first responded to a well-being check but left the resort without contacting either Dracousis or the woman. Police radio traffic reviewed by the Lake and McHenry County Scanner indicated the first call came in around 6:20 a.m. on November 8, with deputies clearing the scene after concluding the victim was not present. Deputies were dispatched back to the trailer around 8:50 a.m. after the woman’s father called to report she was being held against her will, and her mother also called for help, according to Shaw Local…