The June 9th meeting should be extremely interesting. Dennis Shere will talk about his experience as a defense attorney on the Brown's Chicken massacre trial.
This would be a great meting to bring a friend who may be interestred in what Mr Shere has to say.
From the Journal & Topics Editor newspaper
'A Fascinating Experience'
Rotarians Hear Defense Attorney's Insight On Brown's Chicken Massacre
By TODD WESSELL Journal & Topics Editor
Nearly two years after the first defendant in the 1993 Brown's Chicken massacre was convicted of murder, the second defendant is scheduled to go on trial beginning Apr. 12.
James Degorski, who in 1993 was 20-years-old, is accused of murder in the massacre of seven Brown's Chicken employees in Palatine during the late evening hours of Jan. 8 more than 16 years ago. Juan Luna was convicted of murder on May 8, 2007. He avoided being executed when one of 12 jurors held out against the death penalty. Degorski is currently being held in Cook County Jail awaiting his trial set to begin in less than three weeks. Luna is confined to Joliet State Penitentiary hoping one day to get a new trial, according to attorney Dennis Shere. "It's called manufactured hope," he said.
Approximately 25 members of the Park Ridge Rotary Club last week listened as Shere give a 30-minute presentation on Luna's 2007 court case. Shere was involved in that trial as a contract attorney for the defense.
A former Ohio newspaper publisher and Kane County public defender, Shere joined Luna's defense team in January 2004. One of his first jobs was to comb through 300,000 pages of court records to see if he could sift out any clues that might help the defense team. He currently is working on a book about the types of challenges lawyers face when working on defense cases.
"I was always interested in the case," Shere told Rotarians at last week's gathering at Summit Square in Park Ridge. "The state had an overwhelming case against Luna. They had DNA on chicken bones and a partial palm print of his at the scene. There were also two women who had talked to the police and there was a 43 minute videotaped confession given by Luna that was devastating." In that confession, Shere explained, "he admitted to slitting one of the owner's throats while Degorski was shooting people."
After Luna's conviction, the jury was told to determine whether he should be put to death or spend the rest of his life behind bars.
"The state argued why he should die," said Shere. "They said he was involved in multiple killings, that he killed someone and that the crime was cold and calculated. We argued that there was no proof he actually killed someone. We claimed the stabbing of the owner, a woman, would not have killed her." The owner, they believe, died of gunshot wounds.
After spending six hours to reach a verdict of guilty, the jury spent two more hours to decide that he should not be put to death. Eleven jurors felt he should die, but one woman felt otherwise. A unanimous verdict is required. The other jurors, Shere felt, were not willing to fight on for a death sentence adding that he believes "some jurors were secretly happy that one of them was not willing to go along with the others." The lone hold out was a 28-year-old mother of two small children who had worked at a fast food restaurant.
"It was a fascinating experience," said Shere. "I wish I could have been involved in it at age 30 rather than 63." He added that he spent some time with Luna at Statesville about a month ago.
