Tuesday, November 27, 2012
Christopher Vaughn got separate life sentences for the murders of his wife and three children.
Right before a Will County judge dropped four life sentences on Christopher Vaughn, his grief-stricken mother-in-law wondered aloud why he couldn't have abandoned his wife and three children instead of killing them all. "What a coward," said Susan Phillips, the mother of Vaughn's slain wife, Kimberly Vaughn. "If you do not want your family, divorce is always the first option, or even just walking away," Phillips said from the witness stand during Christopher Vaughn's sentencing hearing Tuesday morning. Christopher Vaughn, 38, wanted to shed his family so he could start a new life in the Yukon wilderness with an unwitting stripper. In June 2007, he packed his 34-year-old wife and their three children—Blake, 8, Cassandra, 11, and Abigayle, …
Monday, November 26, 2012
The Drew Peterson media circus prevented Vaughn from getting a fair trial, his lawyer said, and the wife-killer's attorneys didn't help things either.
First, he killed one wife, then he was named a suspect in the disappearance of another, and now Drew Peterson's very existence has mucked up Christopher Vaughn's murder trial, the Oswego man's lawyer said Monday. Vaughn's lawyer, George Lenard, said the specter of Drew Peterson hanging over the Vaughn case is just one of the reasons his convicted quadruple-killer client needs a new trial. Besides the problem with Peterson, whose own murder trial was taking place in the courtroom next-door to Vaughn's in August and September, Lenard claimed Vaughn's case was corrupted when prosecutors succeeded in "indoctrinating" one of the jurors. Lenard also said a prosecutor insulted him during the closing arguments and he accused the jury of "improper …
Saturday, November 24, 2012
Thankfully, it was a short week.
It was a three-day week at the Will County Courthouse, so there wasn't a lot going on. It was nice while it lasted, because that's all going to change next week, starting with Monday's sentencing hearing for quadruple-killer Christopher Vaughn. Vaughn was convicted in September of murdering his wife, 34-year-old Kimberly Vaughn, and three children—Blake, 8, Cassandra, 11, and Abigayle, 12—in June 2007. Vaughn is going to get life in prison. But that's next week. In the week that just ended, we saw Coal City woman Tiffany Unland, 30, fail to convince a judge to further reduce her bond from $120,000 to $50,000. Unland already got it lowered once from $200,000. Unland allegedly killed a Palatine man in a drunken crash on Route 6 in Channahon …
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Tiffany Unland was taken to court in a wheelchair and cried after the judge didn't reduce her bond.
The Coal City woman charged with killing a Palatine man in a drunken crash tried for a second time to get her bond lowered. Tiffany Unland, 30, was rolled into court in a wheelchair but stood up in front of Judge Richard Schoenstedt when her attorney asked to have her bond lowered from $120,000 to $50,000 during a Tuesday morning hearing. Schoenstedt wouldn't budge, sending Unland back to jail where she is being held on charges of aggravated driving under the influence. Unland's bond had already been reduced from $200,000. After Schoenstedt broke the bad news about not going any lower, Unland started crying while speaking with her lawyer, Elizabeth Johnson. Unland allegedly killed 46-year-old Anthony B. Calhoun in an Aug. 31 head-on …
Monday, November 19, 2012
The county and a private nursing company were also named in the suit filed by the attorney for an unidentified man with HIV.
A nurse working at the county jail told an inmate's brother he has HIV, causing him "great humiliation and mental anguish," according to a lawsuit filed in Will County court on Friday. The HIV-infected inmate's name was withheld in the lawsuit. The man's attorney, William R. Cassian, filed a petition to "proceed under (a) fictitious name" on the grounds that the suit "involves very private information that is so sensitive" it is protected by the state's HIV Disclosure Act. The petition says the man is older than 18 and lives in DuPage County. The lawsuit alleges the unidentified man was "confined in the detention center" on Nov. 18, 2011. According to jail records, of the 24 men locked up in the Will County Adult Detention Center on Nov. …
The father of a woman who died in a Wilmington nursing home is suing the place, along with three doctors and a nurse.
The father of a 24-year-old woman who was treated for chest pains at Provena St. Joseph Medical Center and died four days later at a Wilmington nursing home has filed a wrongful death lawsuit. Nebraska resident Fred Saltzman filed the suit in Will County court Friday. Saltzman's daughter, Tenessa Marie Vincent, died in Wilmington's Embassy Care Center in November 2010. An obituary on Legacy.com said Vincent was a Joliet resident. According to the lawsuit, Vincent was admitted to the hospital with chest pains. She was discharged two days later and sent to Embassy Care Center. Between her discharge and death, Vincent was given at least 10 different medications, including a potent painkiller on a transdermal patch, the lawsuit said. An …
Saturday, November 17, 2012
Drew Peterson showed up again, and he had plenty of company.
Former Bolingbrook cop and current Will County jail bird Drew Peterson highlighted the week's courthouse action when a couple of his lawyers showed up with a motion for a new trial. The old trial ended not so well for Peterson, as he was found guilty of murdering his third wife, Kathleen Savio. The motion for a new trial paints former Peterson attorney Joel Brodsky as a publicity hound, and claims a deal he entered with a Florida public relations worker damaged Peterson's chance for a fair trial. What else was going on at the Will County Courthouse? Well, keep reading:
Thursday, November 8, 2012
The son of former Will County Chief Judge Rodney Lechwar was sentenced to eight years in prison but can do as little as four months, said the prosecutor who agreed to his plea deal.
When Will County Judge Rodney Lechwar's son Matthew was arrested for allegedly dealing heroin in 2006, the 24-year-old got his charge dropped by successfully completing a special drug court program. When he was again arrested on a heroin rap six years later, Matthew Lechwar took a plea deal brokered by his attorney and a special prosecutor that could see him sprung from prison in as little as four months. Matthew Lechwar's actual sentence was for eight years in prison, but at the request of his attorney, George Lenard, and special prosecutor Charles Colburn, Judge Edward Burmila recommended Matthew Lechwar as a candidate for the Department of Corrections' Impact Incarceration program. Burmila accepted Matthew Lechwar's plea and made his …
Thursday, November 1, 2012
A man convicted of strangulation and suffocation in Wisconsin was captured in Will County earlier this week.
A Chicago man convicted of strangling someone in Wisconsin was captured in Will County. Alan Clark, 32, was arrested by sheriff's deputies and booked into the county jail Friday. Clark, formerly of Rockford, was living at a shelter in Chicago at the time of his arrest, according to jail records. Clark appeared in court Monday and waived his right to an extradition hearing. He will remain in the South Chicago Street jail until the authorities in Wisconsin send someone to pick him up. Clark was wanted for allegedly violating his probation, according to court papers. Clark was convicted in February 2010 of strangulation and suffocation. He was also found guilty of intimidating a victim. Clark was arrested on the charges in October 2009. Calls…
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
The Will County State's Attorney and the Illinois Attorney General want corporate giant ExxonMobil to make things right after spraying oil all around its Channahon Township plant.
Will County State's Attorney James Glasgow and Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan have teamed up to take on corporate giant ExxonMobil in the wake of its Channahon Township plant sparying oil all over the place. “ExxonMobil must accept full responsibility for the harm this oily mist caused our environment as well as the farms, houses, vehicles, streets and other personal and public property in our surrounding communities,” Glasgow said in a statement released Wednesday. “The preliminary injunction we seek in cooperation with Attorney General Madigan ensures that this incident will be thoroughly investigated and that ExxonMobil will clean up damaged properties and natural resources,” he said. Glasgow and Madigan filed a four-count …
Samara
3:07 am on Monday, April 15, 2013
JAIL.PRISON Please don't put him in P.C. I hope they throw this monster with the general population I wouldn't want to be him..u know what they do to child killers..for with this public pop, he'd wish an cry for the death penalty . leave him in there to rot. more ›