Thursday, February 28, 2013
Drew Peterson was on the move again Thursday and is in another prison.
Drew Peterson wasn't one to be tied down, managing to marry four times in 29 years. And even now that he's been packed off to prison, he's still a rambling man. Peterson, 59, was transferred to his third prison since he was sentenced to serve 38 years a mere seven days ago. Peterson was whisked from the Will County jail to the Northern Reception and Classification Center on the grounds of Stateville prison the day after he was sentenced by Judge Edward Burmila. Ordinary inmates wait for the weekly bus to Stateville, but Drew Peterson is apparently no ordinary inmate, as the Will County Sheriff's Department set up a special trip to get him out quickly. Then at Stateville, where it takes an average of three weeks to two months before a …
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
The trial of a New Lenox man charged with punching a Joliet man into a coma more than three years ago was back in court Wednesday.
The trial of a New Lenox man charged with punching another man into a coma started more than five months ago, and on Wednesday it was back on with testimony from three state police scientists. The scientists were questioned about blood evidence in the case against 24-year-old Joseph Messina, who allegedly beat a man into a coma outside the Mokena bar 191 South back in July 2009. Messina's trial began in June but the high-profile murder prosecutions of wife-killer Drew Peterson and Christopher Vaughn—the Oswego man who executed his wife and three children—forced the postponement of his case. Now, with both Peterson and Vaughn going down guilty, the Messina case is back on. Messina, who is free on a $250,000 bond, allegedly knocked 29-year-…
Saturday, December 1, 2012
Quadruple-killer Christopher Vaughn getting sent to prison for the rest of his life was just one of the things going on at the Will County Courthouse this week.
Last week was a short one, with Thanksgiving Day and Thanksgiving Day II giving us a bit of a break from the courthouse. But we got right back to it Monday with the attorney for quadruple-killer Christopher Vaughn blaming the guilty verdict on Drew Peterson and Drew Peterson's lawyers, among other things. The judge didn't buy this line of reasoning and declined to call a do-over and hold a whole new trial. Then he slammed Vaughn with four life sentences. That was rough. But at least Vaughn got an early start at serving all that time, as the county packed him off to Stateville Correctional Center the very next day. But that's not all. Let's look at what else was going on down at the courthouse during the week that just ended:
Friday, November 30, 2012
The convicted quadruple-killer got a quick start to his new life behind bars.
Will County didn't waste any time ridding themselves of Christopher Vaughn, packing the man who executed his entire family off to prison the day after his sentencing. Vaughn, 38, was shipped up to Stateville Correctional Center to start serving the four life sentences handed down by Judge Daniel Rozak on Tuesday. According to Department of Corrections Records, the former Oswego resident made it to Stateville Wednesday. Vaughn declined to make a statement at his sentencing hearing and sat stone-faced as Rozak told him he would never get out of prison alive. Vaughn's father-in-law, Del Phillips, later said he had hoped Vaughn "would open up and say why" he killed his wife, Kimberly Vaughn, and three children—Blake, 8, Cassandra, 11, and …
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
Drew Peterson defense attorney Joseph "Shark" Lopez called blaming him and his co-counsel for helping send quadruple-killer Christopher Vaughn to prison "desperate."
Christopher Vaughn was staring at a life sentence for executing his entire family unless his lawyer somehow got him a new trial. The lawyer, George Lenard, tried to pull that off by pointing to the boorish behavior exhibited by the attorneys for wife-killer Drew Peterson and claiming it kept his client from getting a fair shake from the jury. Vaughn and Peterson's murder trials overlapped and were conducted in adjacent courtrooms on the fourth floor of the Will County Courthouse. Lenard came and went to the trial without addressing the media while Peterson's attorneys conducted press conferences throughout the day. Lenard recalled one press session and told how three of Peterson's attorneys—Joel Brodsky, Joseph "Shark" Lopez and Steve …
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 …
Vaughn was convicted this summer of killing his wife and three children in a desperate attempt to free himself from responsibilities and start a new life.
Christopher Vaughn had set a plan in motion to start a new life in the Yukon with an unwitting Chicago stripper on whom he had a secret crush. Instead, he will be starting a new life in prison, and he will be staying there until he dies. Vaughn, 38, faces an automatic life sentence for killing his wife, 34-year-old Kimberly Vaughn, and three children—Blake, 8, Cassandra, 11, and Abigayle, 12—in June 2007. The Oswego man will still go through what is expected to be a lengthy sentencing hearing today. Members of Kimberly Vaughn's family are scheduled to testify. The Vaughns were making an early morning trip to a Springfield waterpark when Christopher Vaughn pulled off Interstate 55 and stopped on the frontage road outside Channahon. He …
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, October 9, 2012
Special prosecutor from Springfield who handled the domestic battery case against Democratic state House candidate Natalie Manley dismissed the matter in August.
A series of fortunate events in the three months following Natalie Manley’s arrest on suspicion she battered her adult daughter resulted in the Democrat state rep candidate emerging from her legal ordeal with virtually no trace she spent a night in jail and faced possible prosecution. There is no criminal complaint against Manley on file in the office of the Will County Circuit Clerk, nor is there a misdemeanor case, despite Manley’s arrest on probable cause for domestic battery. Manley also was spared the indignity of a bond hearing in open court, posting $300 for her release from the Will County Jail after First Assistant State’s Attorney Ken Grey got together with Chief Judge Gerald Kinney to appoint a special prosecutor from …
Drew
12:50 am on Friday, April 5, 2013
Point one Shannon Drew is in protective custody. Point two Stacy's and Drew's two small children are being taken care of by the second oldest son Stephen. Point three Shannon, I love being a racist and I am proud of it. Point four Shannon goes back to point one he's in protective custody, he still receives a pension which goes to Stacy's and Drew's kids, point five he receives three square meals … more ›