Monday, December 10, 2012
Patch covers happenings in major court cases, including a former Wheaton man's charges of hiring a fellow inmate to kill two public officials and two others and a Naperville man's sexual exploitation trial.
Wheaton: A judge recently ruled that DuPage prosecutors used an improper tactic to bring a murder-for-hire suspect in for questioning. However, Judge George Bakalis decided the information obtained in the interview, and ultimately the charges filed against Gordon Vanderark, would have been no different if the tactic had not been used, records show. Vanderark is charged with trying to hire a fellow prison inmate to kill a DuPage County Judge and assistant state's attorney tied to a previous felony conviction that landed Vanderark in prison. Prosecutors used a confidential source to learn about Vanderark's plan and set up a "ruse" hearing on an unrelated issue to have Vanderark brought back from the Centralia Correctional Center. Once in …
Monday, November 5, 2012
Patch recaps happenings in major court cases, including the Wheaton Library break-in, a meth conspiracy and solicitation of a police officer.
Lisle/Naperville: Ladislav Fromelius, the former Naperville man who pleaded guilty to soliciting an undercover police officer to attack a person in an estate dispute, was sentenced Oct. 29 to six months in jail and two years of probation for his conviction. Fromelius was arrested in 2010 after a Lisle police investigation, which included Fromelius paying the officer $2,000 to beat up the executor of an estate to which he was a beneficiary. Fromelius, pleaded guilty in September to solicitation of armed violence in a deal with prosecutors, who dropped several other counts. Fromelius was ordered to pay $1,000 to an anti-crime fund, $860 in court costs and was placed on GPS monitoring. He is now living in Aurora with family, records show. …
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Seven men and five women will serve as jurors.
Opening statements in Drew Peterson's much anticipated murder trial are expected to be given Tuesday, July 31 in the Will County Courthouse in Joliet. Attorney Joel Brodsky said he will be the one handling opening statements for the defense and revealed his plan to tell "the story of Drew Peterson, from beginning to end." And when Brodsky is done with that story, said defense attorney Steve Greenberg, the jury will be convinced that Peterson did not murder his third wife, Kathleen Savio, by hitting her in the head and drowning her in a bathtub. "There's going to be no question she slipped in the tub and Drew was home when it happened," said Greenberg, who also scoffed at the idea that fresh bruises were discovered on Savio after her body …
