EVIL PROSECUTORS PUT INNOCENT MEN IN JAIL FOR 10 YEARS

Rolando Cruz and Alejandro Hernandez were wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death for the 1983 kidnaping, rape, and murder of 10-year-old Jeanine Nicarico in DuPage County, Illinois. Prior to their 1985 trial the lead detective in the case resigned in protest that prosecutors were proceeding against innocent men. Nonetheless, prosecutors continued and won convictions, thanks to the testimony of officers who falsely claimed that Cruz had told them details of the crime that only the killer would have known.

Shortly after the trial, a repeat sex offender and murderer — Brian Dugan — confessed that he alone had committed the crime, as well as a series of other crimes, including two rape-murders and three rapes. Many of these crime were similar to the crime for which Cruz and Hernandez were sitting on death row, and several witnesses established conclusively that Dugan was the sole perpetrator in the other crimes he had described.

Although Dugan's confession that he alone killed Jeanine Nicarico was corroborated by overwhelming evidence - as shown by a Chicago Lawyer investigation headed by Rob Warden — prosecutors steadfastly refused to acknowledge that they had put the wrong men on death row. And, after the Illinois Supreme Court reversed the convictions, prosecutors retried Cruz and Hernandez and again won — largely because much of the evidence proving that Dugan had committed the crime was excluded from the courtroom.

In 1990, a volunteer legal team led by Lawrence C. Marshall agreed to represent Cruz on appeal. After four years of arduous litigation, the Illinois Supreme Court reversed Cruz's conviction in 1994, and granted him a third trial. Prior to that trial, newly available DNA testing excluded Cruz and Hernandez as the child's rapists and linked Dugan to the crime. Even so, prosecutors refused to drop the case.

At trial, Cruz was represented by a team of four lawyers, including Marshall. During the trial, a police officer admitted that he had lied under oath in relation to testimony about Cruz's purported statement. After hearing all of the prosecution's evidence, the trial judge directed a verdict of not guilty. Prosecutors later dropped charges against Hernandez....

In the aftermath of the Cruz trial, a special grand jury indicted four sheriff's deputies and three former prosecutors for their roles in the Cruz case. Charges included perjury and obstruction of justice. Although a DuPage County jury acquitted these men of those charges, the County later agreed to pay $3.5 million to settle the civil rights claims that Cruz, Hernandez, and Stephen Buckley (a third defendant who had been charged in the crime) had filed in federal court.

In December 2002, Cruz received a pardon based on innocence from Illinois Governor George H. Ryan.

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Sequel

On Nov. 29 Brian J. Dugan was indicted on 15 counts of murder in connection with the 1983 kidnapping, rape and death of 10-year-old Naperville fifth-grader Jeanine Nicarico. The indictment ended years of speculation as to whether Dugan, who in the mid-1980s admitted to his attorney his role in the crime, would ever be formally charged with Nicarico's killing.....

Dugan admitted to killing Nicarico while negotiating plea agreements in 1985 regarding the murders of Geneva nurse Donna Schnorr, 27, and Melissa Ackerman, 7, of Somonauk. He would not confess formally without a guarantee of exemption from the death penalty....

Two grand juries were impaneled in 2005 to investigate Dugan's role in the slaying. As time passed and forensic science and DNA technology advanced, evidence found on Jeanine's body linked Dugan to the crime. The second grand jury returned a 15-count indictment that alleged the murder was committed amid a series of forcible felonies, including home invasion, rape, aggravated kidnapping, deviant sexual assault, indecent liberties with a child and burglary.

DuPage County State's Attorney Joseph E. Birkett, who came under fire about five years ago from a citizen's group for failing to indict Dugan earlier, announced he would seek the death penalty for Dugan and also said the indictment did not mean the investigation was over as to whether other people might be involved. Dugan is serving two life sentences in the Pontiac Correctional Center for the deaths of Ackerman and Schnorr. His case has not been assigned to a judge yet.

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