Several witnesses are expected to testify Wednesday, concluding 10 days of testimony, before closing arguments by Assistant State's Attys. Nancy Wolfe and Robert Berlin and Public Defender Robert Miller. The prosecution and defense teams met Tuesday with Judge Robert Anderson to review the voluminous instructions the jury will get after closing arguments and before it begins deliberations. State's Atty.
Joseph Birkett is seeking the death penalty for Hanson, 31, who admits using his parents' identities to secure tens of thousands of dollars' worth of credit card loans without their knowledge, but denies involvement in their Sept. 28, 2005, deaths. If the 12-member jury returns a guilty verdict Wednesday, prosecutors will then ask the jury to find the defendant legally eligible for the death penalty. Birkett contends Hanson is eligible for the punishment based on several state statutes, including that he committed multiple murders and killed a witness to a crime. If the jury votes unanimously that Hanson is eligible for the death penalty, the same jury will decide in a third hearing whether he should be sentenced to death. During jury selection, Anderson told candidates the guilt or innocence phase and the eligibility phase are to be based on evidence beyond a reasonable doubt. However, Anderson told them that when deciding if Hanson should be sentenced to death, the verdict needs to be unanimous based on a preponderance of the evidence.
Ex-jailer's trial begins. Eric Hanson's quadruple-murder trial to begin. Thursday in the quadruple-murder trial of Eric Hanson. My Life Began with David Bowie.
Hanson testified on his own behalf for five hours Friday, saying he did not kill Terrance and Mary Hanson and Kate Hanson-Tsao and Jimmy Tsao. ------------ abarnum@tribune.com.
'We were the ones who told him,' said Karen Tom, a Wheaton woman who visits Hanson weekly to minister to the 33-year-old man she considers a son. 'I took his hand as my husband read the Bible and told him he lost the appeal. He looked very sober. There was a tear in his eye. He did say he was preparing himself for that. Cards Against Humanity 4th Expansion Pdf Reader here. ' Hanson is the second-youngest of 16 men on Illinois' death row at Pontiac Correctional Center. A DuPage County jury convicted him in 2008 during a high-profile trial in Circuit Judge Robert Anderson's courtroom.
All death sentences are appealed directly to the state high court. Hanson argued the jury convicted him with circumstantial evidence during a trial riddled with reversible legal errors. His attorney cited nine issues, such as testimony from Hanson's older sister about an incriminating conversation she said she had with the slain sister weeks before the murders. Game Over Dealing With Bullies In The Church. 29, 2005, police discovered the bludgeoned bodies of Katherine 'Kate' Hanson-Tsao, 31, along with her husband, Jimmy Tsao, 34, in their home in the White Eagle subdivision in Aurora. Terrance Hanson, 57, and his wife, Mary, 55, also were found slain there. The elder couple were shot in their bed in their Naperville home, on Rock Spring Court, where Eric lived, then taken to Kate's house five miles away.
The defendant's other sibling, Jennifer Williams, who lived out of state, identified him as a suspect within an hour of the grisly discovery. She said Hanson threatened to kill their sister, Kate, six weeks earlier if she told their dad Eric stole more than $80,000 from the parents in a credit card scheme. Prosecutors lacked a confession, both murder weapons and, despite two crime scenes with four bodies, a single hair, fiber, fingerprint or shoe print or DNA placing Hanson at either location. In fact, seven unidentified partial bloody shoe prints found at his sister's home were not traced back to Eric.
But the existence of a second crime scene in Naperville was crucial because Hanson placed himself in the home that night. He told jurors he was sleeping downstairs and didn't hear a disturbance, despite the killer's extensive cleaning of the crime scene. There were no signs of forced entry.
Police arrested Hanson after he returned from a one-day trip in Los Angeles to visit his ex-fiancee. Officers found Kate's $24,000 wedding ring and Jimmy's Rolex watch in Hanson's SUV. He explained he simply was returning the jewelry, but didn't get a chance before his trip. But he couldn't explain another piece of evidence crucial to the prosecution. Hanson told jurors he had no idea how a rubber glove with his father's blood ended up in a zipped plastic bag, along with three other gloves, in his SUV. The prosecution team - Robert Berlin, Michael Wolfe, Nancy Wolfe - argued the financial motive, timeline, GPS technology, and the other evidence such as the bloody glove and Hanson's multiple lies were overwhelming proof.
The jury - and now the Illinois Supreme Court - agreed. Justices affirmed Hanson's murder conviction and death sentence, but they did vacate his aggravated kidnapping charges based on a perfunctory legal issue. Eric Hanson maintains his innocence. His remaining family members haven't visited him in prison, Tom said. 'We are his family now,' she said, 'and we love him.'