scotillo 3: Scotillo and witness taampering?

Scotillo and witness taampering?

Witness tampering is harming or otherwise threatening a witness, hoping to influence his or her testimony.

In the United States, the crime of witness tampering in federal cases is defined by statute at 18 U.S.C. § 1512, "Tampering with a witness, victim, or an informant". The punishment for such an offense is up to 20 years if physical force was used or attempted, and up to 10 years if physical force was only threatened. The tampering need not have actually been successful in order for it to be criminal.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witness_tampering

What if, Wenrich or Hunter that were high on drugs on my arrest, wanted to change the testimoney as to be less creditable. But the assistant states attornies and judge deceided and ordered the police officers not to change their story.

John J. SCOTILLO
Present Judicial Duties
1997-Present: Associate Judge, Circuit Court, Third Municipal District
Previous Judicial Duties
Associate Judge, Circuit Court, First Municipal District
Appointed Associate Judge in 1988.
Evaluation
2004 Primary & General Elections – Circuit Court: Well Qualified
The Honorable John J. Scotillo has served as an Associate Judge since 1988. He has sat
in the Third Municipal District in Rolling Meadows since 1997 and currently hears the felony trial
call there. Prior to his current assignment, he sat in the First Municipal District. After his
admission to practice law in 1976, Judge Scotillo spent four years as an Assistant Cook County
State’s Attorney and later spent nine years as a solo general practitioner. Judge Scotillo is widely
respected as a jurist with excellent legal ability. He is considered hard-working with a good
temperament, and has a reputation of being prepared and aware of

I say, Scotillo must have fallen off of this "well qualified" wagon, I doubt this was the first case, off the wagon. He Started as a assistant cook County State's attorney, so did defense lawyer 2, Glasgo.

A piece of dirt is a piece of dirt, weather your a mugger, raper, school teacher, store clerk, thief or judge. In my case he has obstructed justice. I have let over 3500 professionals know and if they let it slide, welcome to Illinois dirt.

http://www.chicagocouncil.org/judicial_pdfs/S/John%20J.%20Scotillo.pdf

'Brutal execution' alleged, but judge to decide Palatine case

By Erin Holmes | Daily Herald Staff

Published: 1/7/2008 2:34 PM | Updated: 1/8/2008 12:13 AM

On the phone with a 911 operator the morning of Aug. 12, 2005, a frantic Diana Thames tells authorities her friend is hurt -- "real bad" -- and bleeding from the chest.

"I need an ambulance," she manages, and then: "There was a man here," explaining that she'd been asleep in her friend's Palatine condo when she heard the doorbell ring, heard a male voice and, later, awoke as the front door shut to find Cindy Wolosick viciously stabbed in her bed.

Prosecutors, though, allege it was Thames who'd held the knife -- plunging it repeatedly into her best friend's body with such force that the tip was embedded in Wolosick's skull and snapped off.

In all, Wolosick suffered 62 stab wounds.

The slaying was a "brutal execution," assistant state's attorney Mike Andre said Monday morning, in the opening minutes of Thames' murder trial. Wolosick, he said, was "filleted like a piece of meat by this butcher."

Thames' lawyer, Kathleen Zellner, argued Thames -- who she says has had carpal tunnel surgery on both wrists -- wouldn't be able to pull off the grisly murder, and certainly wouldn't stick around to call police.

The killing was fueled by rage and animosity, Zellner said, and "there were (other) people in Cindy's life she had volatile relationships with."

The fate of Thames, 50, will be decided in a bench trial before Cook County Judge John Scotillo, meaning he alone will hear evidence and determine the final verdict.

Wolosick, 46, was a speech and language pathologist at Palatine's Lake Louise school, but she also co-owned a home rehab and resale business with Thames in Thames' hometown of Bloomington.

The two had been friends for more than two decades.

Prosecutors say the duo, who had just come back from a Mexico vacation with other friends, had argued over financial issues relating to their business before Thames, who spent the night at Wolosick's condo, killed her in her bed.

The confrontation, Andre said, dealt with an investor who'd been trying to remove a portion of his investment from the company but had not gotten his money back.

"(But) the idea that there's a financial motive in this case is wildly untrue," Zellner said.

Thames eventually confessed to the crime, and that was caught on tape -- one of the first tests of a state law requiring such documentation in murder cases. But Scotillo in August ruled that many of those statements to police couldn't be played at her trial.

In response to Zellner's arguments that Thames had been denied an attorney and intimidated into confessing, he barred anything Thames said after requesting a lawyer.

Prosecutors have argued Thames voluntarily waived her right to an attorney and talked freely to the police.

An earlier 45 minutes of the taped interview were played in court Monday, revealing Thames' first version of her final night with her friend.

She tells police the two had eaten Taco Bell takeout, then watched TV and talked before heading to bed around 1 a.m.

At some point afterward, she says, she was awakened by the door buzzer ringing. She said she heard Wolosick open the door, and heard a man's voice afterward.

She didn't get out of bed to see who the man was, she told police, and she didn't hear the conversation. When she awoke later, she says she heard a motorcycle leaving. She never looked out the window to see who it was, she said, but "I wish I had."

Thames, becoming emotional, then tells police she found Wolosick lying on her bed -- and says she climbed up with her when her friend began calling her name.

She later grabbed a towel from the bathroom, she says, to try to clean up Wolosick.

In the courtroom Monday, Thames wiped away tears as she listened to the tape.

Also in the tape, she says wounds on her hands came from things that happened on vacation and from when Wolosick reached out to her while they were on the bed.

When asked about a missing acrylic nail -- one was found at the scene -- she says it must have fallen off while she was with Wolosick.

The confession portion of the tape won't be played, but Andre told Scotillo on Monday that prosecutors will offer "piece after piece after piece of circumstantial evidence,"

And "it points in one direction only," he told Scotillo. "It points to Diana Thames."

Other witnesses called on Monday included authorities who responded to the murder scene. A paramedic testified Wolosick's body was cool to the touch; he also said blood on her arms appeared to be dry.

The murder trial is scheduled to resume again at 11 a.m. in Room 110 of the Rolling Meadows courthouse.

http://www.dailyherald.com/story/print/?id=108475

Palatine cops beat immigrant in cell

Pinoy immigrant accuses Illinois cops of brutality

10Mar08

PALATINE, Illinois — Stepfather knows best.

Chicago’s suburban Palatine, Illinois police officers found this out when they ignored the plea of Rick Holmes to take his stepson, Louie B. Salisid, to the police station instead of the hospital more than a year ago.

Salisid, who was 36 at that time, was having a “mental breakdown” from a bipolar disorder when he attacked his stepfather who was dozing off in his reclining chair in the early afternoon of Oct. 25th, 2006.

Even while having a difficulty of breathing and with a bloodied face from the beating by his stepson, Holmes managed to call 9-1-1 emergency for assistance after his stepson stormed out of their house in Palatine.

When paramedics came, Holmes asked them to look for his stepson and asked them to take him to the hospital.

However, the first responding Palatine officer, Dan Mesch, immediately took Salisid to the police station. Mesch’s partner, Dan Weidman, assured Holmes that he will relay his request to Mesch to take his stepson to the hospital.

Mesch testified before Judge John J. Scotillo of the Third Municipal District of the Circuit Court of Cook County in neighboring suburb of Rolling Meadows during the trial that he had just taken off the handcuffs from Salisid when Mesch told Salisid to sit down.

Mesch said he, then, saw Salisid, clinched his “fist and swung towards my face,” hitting his nose and lip and breaking his nose bridge.

Mesch added, Salisid “continued to throw punches and kicks towards me” when his fellow officer, Dan Weidman, walked in to assist in subduing Salisid.

But Holmes did not buy Mesch’s story, saying that Salisid told him later that “after punching the cop in a holding area of the Police station, Louie was handcuffed, dragged to a cell, thrown face down on a cot and a cop came in the cell, grabbed Louie by the hair and hit him twice about the eye.” That was the reason, his stepson had a “black eye,” Holmes told this reporter.

Last Thursday, March 6th, Judge Scotillo found Salisid “in need of mental health services on an outpatient basis” for the next seven years from Oct. 25, 2006, the day Salisid was released from the hospital.

During the bench trial of the case last Oct. 18, 2007, Judge Scotillo found Salisid not guilty by reason of insanity of the charge of aggravated battery for attacking a police officer (Mesch), which is a felony.

On the same day, the domestic battery, Weidman initially filed on behalf of Holmes when Salisid “punched Holmes several times with a closed fist about the face causing cuts and bruises by the nose and mouth,” was also dropped.

Holmes refused to press charges against Salisid because Holmes believes his stepson “was not in a right frame of mind” when Salisid attacked him in their home.

Last Thursday, Scotillo also ordered Salisid to follow the recommendations of the Illinois Department of Human Services (IDHS) treatment and medication management plan that will be administered by Salisid’s psychiatric physician, Dr. Renato De Los Santos , who must provide the court Salisid’s progress report every 90 days until Oct. 25, 2013.

De los Santos must also “provide Salisid’s report to Dr. Anderson Freeman of the IDHS and Keith Nelson.”

The case dragged for several months because Holmes and his wife, Violeta (nee: Bolodo), mother of Louie, could not find another Visayan interpreter after the first interpreter, Geanette Ruiz, had become unavailable. Holmes blames the Cook County state attorney for dragging the case, by using the “lame excuse of not getting documentation until the day before several times.”

The hearing moved forward last Thursday, when a province mate of Louie from his native Plaridel, Misamis Occidental, Ms. Linda Evangelista, a registered nurse, volunteered to act as his court interpreter.

In the Philippines, Louie was diagnosed as having bi-polar disorder. After the incident, Louie was diagnosed as having paranoia schizophrenia.

Louie immigrated to the United States less than three years ago. He speaks Visaya and a “little English.”

Louie now works as a part-time Line Server for Old Country Buffet restaurant at Rolling Meadows by filling up items on the buffet that is depleted. His mother works as a window clerk at the U.S. Postal Service in suburban Algonquin, Illinois.

Private defense Atty. David G. Pugh assisted Louie in his defense.

Holmes and his wife, Violeta, said that now that the criminal case is over, they are on the prowl for a lawyer, who can assist them in filing a civil case against the Palatine police department for “incompetence, brutality and misconduct” of its police officers toward their son as they failed to observe protocol in handling cases of individual with abnormal states of mind, such as “restraining, instead of retaliating” plus “something for pain and suffering.”

Holmes said, “if only the police allowed the paramedics, who were on the scene, to take Salisid to the hospital, me and my wife would be $50,000 richer (the amount that cost Palatine for police mishandling of the case). Louie would not have gotten beat up and would not have suffered nine months of pain due to the brain trauma and we would have a lot of time in our hands of not having to go to court for the last year and a half.”

They said they only have seven months left to file a civil case before the statute of limitation will lapse.

Mesch and Weidman did not return phone calls left on their voice mails by this reporter for comment.

http://www.pinoyoverseas.net/news/?p=157

scotillo 3

Scotillo and witness taampering?

Scotillo, Blomquist and Andre, what another side deal

Palatine cops beat immigrant in cell

Pinoy immigrant accuses Illinois cops of brutality