Wisconsin sheriff sues over Skokie woman’s detainment ‘hoax,’ shares evidence

The Dodge County Sheriff has sued a Skokie woman for defamation and on Friday provided information that appears to discredit the story the woman’s supporters publicized last month of her federal detainment and transportation to the Wisconsin county’s jail. 

Dodge County Sheriff Dale Schmidt is seeking $1 million in damages each from Summer Sundas “Sunny” Naqvi, the Skokie woman; Kevin Morrison, a family friend of Naqvi; and up to 10 undisclosed members of the media for reputational injury, his civil lawsuit shows. 

Supporters of Naqvi made headlines in March during a press conference outside a federal detention facility in Broadview where they reported that federal immigration authorities detained Naqvi, 28, a U.S citizen, for more than 40 hours across two different detention centers, including one in Dodge County, Wisconsin.

But standing before a press junket inside his station in Juneau on Friday morning, Schmidt shared bank statements, surveillance images, text messages and more that indicate Naqvi’s story was a lie and she never even traveled to Broadview or Juneau last month.

Instead, an unnamed “victim” — who Schmidt said had a three-year relationship with Naqvi — spent thousands of dollars to fund her plans, including a hotel stay near O’Hare that March weekend. He also drove her to Wisconsin on March 7, where Naqvi was eventually picked up by friends and family, Schmidt said. 

Naqvi did not speak publicly about her claims during the March 8 press conference and has not responded to The Record’s multiple attempts to contact her via phone, email and at her Skokie home. The five coworkers with whom she reportedly was traveling before landing at O’Hare airport have also not identified themselves.

“It is my understanding that a lawsuit has been filed, I have not seen it. And if a suit has in fact been filed, I cannot comment on pending litigation,” Morrison said by text on Friday.

The Record could not reach Naqvi’s sister, Sarah Afzal, for comment on Friday. Reached by phone on Thursday, Robert Held, an attorney who said March 8 he represented Naqvi, said he does not represent Naqvi and declined to comment further.

Schmidt said his presentation Friday was aimed at disproving Naqvi’s narrative that multiple law enforcement agencies last month transported her across state lines and then covered it up. Schmidt provided information to show Naqvi had previously reported unsubstantiated claims to other law enforcement, including the Skokie Police Department.  

But the sheriff said the investigation did not identify a law that Naqvi and others broke in the state of Wisconsin in reference to this investigation. And so, while his criminal investigation remains open, Schmidt said he is bringing no criminal charges against Naqvi and others. 

Speaking to what he hopes to accomplish with the lawsuit, Schmidt said he hopes it sends a message.

“To me it’s not about a dollar figure,” Schmidt said of the lawsuit. “To me, we have a victim here who was played, and not just one victim. We have a victim in this incident (and other victims in other incidents) … and she continues to do this and get away with it.

“I don’t have any charges here in Dodge County to bring against her. My only recourse is to make sure that the public knows that she can’t do this.”

Initial claims

To The Record’s knowledge, Naqvi has never publicly shared her account of allegedly being detained and transported to various detention facilities last month. 

Afzal and Morrison, who was then a candidate for the Cook County Board of Commissioners, said Naqvi was returning from an overseas work trip with coworkers on March 5. Held previously said Customs and Border Protection stopped Naqvi at O’Hare as they had questions about her “travel history.”

A LinkedIn account bearing Naqvi’s name states she works as a senior solutions architect for SAP, a German software company. 

“We can confirm that SAP is unaware of a Sunny (Sundas) Naqvi being a current or former contractor. While there is a possibility she works/worked for a third party who may have done work with or for SAP, we cannot confirm any affiliation,” said Marcus Winkler, SAP’s co-head of global public relations, in an email to The Record.

A man that Schmidt anonymously referred to as Naqvi’s “victim” recently got in contact with the sheriff and disclosed in a recorded interview that he spent at least $15,000 and took out a personal loan to fund Naqvi’s trip overseas, Schmidt said. 

At the Hampton

Afzal and Morrison also shared information about how tracking data from Naqvi’s cellphone reportedly showed she was held at O’Hare for more than 24 hours starting on March 5; then she was reportedly transported to the detention facility in Broadview, a near-west suburb, and then to the one in Juneau, Wisconsin.

In a statement on social media March 10, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security called Naqvi’s account “blatantly FALSE” and published screenshots from surveillance footage at O’Hare that reportedly showed Naqvi leaving an inspection area at 11:42 a.m. on March 5. 

Schmidt said Naqvi’s phone location could have been “spoofed very easily” and shared screenshots of alleged text messages between the victim and Naqvi that show Naqvi checked into an O’Hare-area hotel on March 5 and asked to use the victim’s card to pay for food. 

An itemized bill from the Hampton Inn and Suites hotel, 9480 Higgins Road, near O’Hare, shows Naqvi as the stay’s primary guest; she checked into the hotel at 1:17 p.m. on March 5, Schmidt said. 

On March 6, more text messages between the victim and Naqvi show her asking to use his card to pay for a spa treatment and food, Schmidt said; at 3:37 p.m. on March 6, Naqvi allegedly asked the victim if she should check out from the hotel. 

Yet according to the narrative Afzal and Morrison presented to the public, CBP held Naqvi at O’Hare for at least a day before her cellphone “pinged” around 4:17 p.m. on March 6 inside the federal detention center in Broadview. 

Afzal, Morrison, then-congressional candidate Reed Showalter and others gathered outside the Broadview detention center on March 6 to demand Naqvi’s release, the group previously said. 

The Cook County Sheriff’s Department confirmed via email they searched for Naqvi at the detention facility in Broadview on March 6 but did not find her.

Driving to Wisconsin

Naqvi’s story, as previously told by her sister, Afzal, included that she was transported to a detention facility in Dodge County overnight March 6-7 and was released to her own devices around 5 a.m.

But according to Schmidt, Naqvi asked the victim to drive her to Wisconsin early March 7 to help her sister who allegedly was having car trouble. 

On their way north the two stopped at a Fireside Market Gas Station located in Slinger, Wisconsin, Schmidt said, who shared surveillance images from inside that gas station that appear to show Naqvi at 5:46 a.m. on March 7, Schmidt said. The individual in the images is wearing the same striped sweater Naqvi is wearing in a photograph Morrison shared on March 7. 

Schmidt also said automated license plate readers captured the victim’s car twice — at 6:04 a.m. and 6:16 a.m. on March 7 — along the route to the Holiday Inn Express & Suites at 311 Seippel Blvd in Beaver Dam, where Naqvi allegedly asked the victim to drive her. 

Surveillance footage from outside a hotel in Beaver Dam and inside the Holiday Inn capture Naqvi, in the same striped sweater, between 6:30-6:40 a.m. March 7, Schmidt said. 

Naqvi is seen on camera exiting the hotel around 6:50 a.m. to meet her sister and two other individuals who picked her up in a car and drove away, Schmidt said. 

According to Schmidt, Naqvi later returned to the Hampton Inn & Suites near O’Hare to check out of the hotel at 1:32 p.m. on March 8. 

Afzal previously said she was on her way to file a missing persons police report in Skokie when tracking data from Naqvi’s cellphone around 2:20 a.m. on March 7 showed that Naqvi had relocated to the Dodge County Jail in Juneau. According to that story, Naqvi was released around 5 a.m., walked to a nearby gas station and hitched a ride with a stranger to the Holiday Inn in Beaver Dam, and Afzal then drove there to pick her up.

‘This is not a misunderstanding’

Schmidt said the victim met Naqvi on an online platform and ultimately provided her up to $25,000 — including $1,000 to a law firm in March — in the span of weeks as “he thought there was a very long-term relationship in their future.”

“This is not a misunderstanding or a minor discrepancy,” the sheriff said Friday. “This is not a violation of the constitutional or civil rights of Sundas Naqvi or those allegedly with her. The timeline being claimed is not physically possible based on the evidence we have and that matters.”

Schmidt said he has been unable to contact Naqvi or any attorney she might have, but he has spoken with the FBI, the Illinois State Police and local law enforcement agencies on behalf of the victim. 

The sheriff said he cannot confirm the status of any other agency’s investigation. He said he has concerns whether the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office will pursue a case against Naqvi, leading him to file civil complaint, he said, to pursue accountability and correct the record on “false narratives” spread by the media about his staff.

About 10 “John Doe” defendants in his lawsuit are for individuals in the media who the complaint says disseminated defamatory statements.

Law and legal history

According to Schmidt, Naqvi reported to Skokie police in June 2019 that she had been attacked and sexually assaulted by an ex-boyfriend at Lawler Park. 

Officers apparently collected extensive evidence of visible injuries, but a subsequent investigation determined Naqvi’s claims were unsubstantiated and constituted a false report, Schmidt said. 

In February 2020, Naqvi reported to Skokie police there was an impaired driver in a Walmart parking lot, but officers arrived and determined there were no signs of intoxication or criminal activity, Schmidt said. 

The driver told police he had just met a woman through a dating app and was waiting for her to return from the store, and investigators determined the complaint was “false and not made in good faith,” Schmidt said. 

According to the Chicago Tribune, public records show that Naqvi pleaded guilty in 2022 to making a false police report alleging sexual assault in 2019, and she reportedly completed two years of probation for that case in 2024 before the case was then dismissed.

According to reporting from The News-Gazette, Naqvi accused a University of Illinois professor in 2019 of sexual misconduct. 

The professor, Joseph Petry, later resigned from UIUC before suing UIUC in 2020 for an alleged breach of contract and wrote in his lawsuit that the allegations “were fabricated and the result of a student’s failed attempt to blackmail Petry into changing her grade,” according to the reporting.

In July 2020, a Champaign County judge granted Petry’s request for an order of protection from Naqvi as he alleged Naqvi was stalking him, public court records show. 

The News-Gazette reported that Naqvi was expelled from UIUC. Pat Wade, UIUC’s director of communications confirmed Naqvi attended the university from the fall of 2017 to the spring of 2019, but has no record of her obtaining a degree.

Public Champaign County court records show Naqvi was charged with seven different felonies between May 2019 and December 2020. In every case, a judge ruled in favor of Naqvi and acquitted her of the charges or state prosecutors dismissed their charges. 

Those now dismissed charges included three counts of filing a false report.

Naqvi is also listed in public Cook County court records as a defendant in four different civil lawsuits. 

Judges dismissed two of those lawsuits after Cook County Sheriff’s deputies were unable to contact Naqvi to serve her summons, court records show.

Naqvi has also been sued by a property management company and JPMorgan Chase for, in both cases, failure to pay thousands of dollars.

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