Two men retried and reconvicted of a North Chicago murder in a rare twin-jury retrial earlier this year will have their post-trial motions heard together as well.
A hearing on motions and possible sentencing for William Fillyaw, one of two men convicted in January of first-degree murder for the shooting death of a North Chicago woman, was originally scheduled for Tuesday but delayed until April 23 after a request by defense attorney James Schwarzbach.
Explaining the request, Schwarzbach said he wants post-trial motions heard together for his client, Fillyaw, 37, and the second convicted defendant, Johnny Parker, 31, both of North Chicago.
“The arguments (for both defendants) will be almost identical,” Schwarzbach said, adding that his chief concern is that rulings don’t conflict when their arguments move to the appellate level.
Reached by phone after the hearing, Parker’s defense attorney, Greg Nikitas, said he has no objection to combining the hearings.
“It makes sense from an efficiency standpoint,” he said.
Both men were convicted of first-degree murder and attempted murder related to a bloody home invasion during which prosecutors said Fillyaw, armed with a shotgun, and Parker, armed with a handgun, kicked open the door of Lasondra Shaw’s North Chicago apartment after midnight June 29, 2007.
They fired at the occupants of the apartment before fleeing. Shaw was killed and others in the apartment were injured.
Officials decided to institute a rare, twin-jury format for the January trial. It marked the first such trial in Lake County in nearly three decades.
The complexities of the format also have been reflected in the post-trial motions.
Schwarzbach and attorney Lawrence Wade, the defense team for Fillyaw, have said their motions allege implementation of a twin-jury trial prejudiced jurors against both defendants; if jurors believed one to be guilty, they would consider both guilty.
Wade has also argued that the retrial violated an Illinois Appellate Court directive that the two men’s trials be severed.
Lake County Judge Mark Levitt, who presided over the trial, is hearing the motions and will also sentence the men. Fillyaw and Parker cannot be sentenced to more than the 60 years they received after their first trials in 2009. They face a sentencing range of 20 to 60 years, and will receive credit for time already served.
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Fillyaw and Parker were retried because their 2009 convictions were reversed by an Illinois Appellate Court. According to the 2011 appellate ruling, trial errors included the admission of problematic witness statements.
Nikitas represented Parker in both the original trial and the retrial, as Schwarzbach did for Fillyaw.
Assistant State’s Attorneys Victor O’Block and Ryan Koehl prosecuted the case, telling the juries that the men turned the apartment into “a shooting gallery.”
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