Kelly rejected arguments by public defenders representing the two boys who have been charged with murder in juvenile petitions that police officers pulled them off the street and placed them in custody before they had probable cause to arrest them. However, Kelly said of evidence and testimony about the way police initially handled the incident, “There is absolutely nothing to indicate that these officers treated these boys like they were under arrest. They were treated like witnesses or victims.”
The judge ruled that the two were originally brought to police headquarters because they were believed to be potential witnesses to Eric’s death.
It was only after Eric’s brother subsequently identified them as the ones who caused his brother’s death that they were formally arrested, Kelly said.
Police said the brother claimed the boys forced Eric out of the window of the vacant 14th-floor apartment in the Ida B. Wells development after he refused to steal candy for them.
The brother, Derrick Lemons, 8, said when he grabbed Eric’s hand, one of the other boys bit him, forcing him to lose his grip, and the victim plunged to his death.
Attorneys for the defendants had accused police of lying in court to cover their tracks because of the improper arrest of the boys in the 3900 block of South Vincennes Avenue, near where Eric died.
But police testified at the hearing, which has gone on sporadically since April, that they made unintentional errors in the report of the arrests.
Although Kelly acknowledged that the report filled out by Police Officer Ryan Milot, a three-year member of the force, was “legally inaccurate”, she blamed it on the officer’s inexperience and lack of legal training.
“They were in police custody, but that doesn’t mean they were under arrest,” she said.
But the attorneys for the two boys argued that the police officers never informed them they could leave.