A jury will be permitted to visit the industrial park where Hampshire police Sgt. Gregory Sears was shot and killed more than a year and a half ago, a Kane County judge ruled Wednesday.
John Carroccia, 51, of Rockford, is scheduled to stand trial March 11 on two counts of first-degree murder in the death of Sears, 50, his lifelong friend. Carroccia is free on $400,000 bail.
Sears’ body was found about 8:50 p.m. on June 1, 2000, near his squad car in the Elgiloy Industrial Park, near U.S. Highway 20 and Interstate Highway 90. Police believe someone shot Sears three times in the head while he was on duty.
Defense attorney Stephen Komie said Wednesday that it will be significant for the jury to visit the crime scene to better understand his contention that a key prosecution witness did not have a clear and unobstructed view on the night of the shooting.
“It substantially allows the jurors to have a sense of distance and to place events in the actual location and allow them to use their own senses to see the witness testimony in the light of their reality,” Komie said.
The witness, an employee of a nearby manufacturing firm who was outside on a loading dock the evening Sears was slain, told police he saw a man walk to a red van and drive away from the scene.
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The employee, who was nearly 500 feet away, described the man as 5 feet 7 inches or 5 feet 8 inches tall, with curly brown hair and weighing 170 pounds.
“We have no problem with the jury going to the crime scene,” said Assistant State’s Atty. Robert Berlin, who did not object to Komie’s motion.
Also on Wednesday, both the prosecution and the defense filed lists of witnesses who could testify at the murder trial, according to court records.
In a development last week, Circuit Judge Grant Wegner granted another defense request by ordering Sears’ widow to turn over to the court by March 8 mental health records relating to a memory loss she experienced regarding Sears’ death.
Norma Jean Sears, 51, whose statements after the killing led police to suspect Carroccia, testified during a preliminary hearing in April that she had no memory of her husband’s death or of the three weeks that followed it and did not remember talking to police.
“If the judge determines they need to be turned over to the attorneys, he will turn them over,” Berlin said. “He needs to conduct an inspection first as to their relevance.”