Lots Of Joliet Area Murder Trials Set For 2024

JOLIET, IL — After Jermaine Mandley fatally shot one of his girlfriends, Maya Smith, in a Joliet street alley in January, he did something very few of Joliet's first-degree defendants choose to do. He wanted his murder trial as soon as possible. In August, a Will County jury found Mandley guilty after deliberating less than 30 minutes. In November, Judge Dave Carlson sent Mandley back to the Illinois Department of Corrections, this time for the rest of his life.

Compared to Mandley, most of Joliet's murder defendants take a different approach. Many prefer to wait five years, sometimes even longer, as they remain in their cell at the Will County Jail, waiting for their murder trial to happen.

This week, Joliet Patch compiled an extensive list by reviewing Will County Courthouse files of Joliet area first-degree murder defendants whose cases are on the docket for a trial in 2024.

Peter Zabala, incarcerated by Joliet police on October 22, 2018.

It's been five years and more than two months since Joliet police detectives brought Peter Zabala back to the Will County Jail and had him locked away on first-degree murder charges following the disappearance of 25-year-old Joliet resident Ashley Tucker.

Over the past several years, Zabala has taken an active role in preparing his defense, working closely with his hired counsel, downtown Joliet attorney Chuck Bretz. Tucker vanished late at night after attending a small party in Joliet. Nearly two weeks later, Tucker's remains were discovered by Joliet police inside a burn barrel on the north edge of Joliet. Her body was set on fire after her violent death.

Trial date: March 11, Courtroom 405 of Judge Carlson

Michael Kazecki, whose mother posted 10 percent of his $2 million bail in August 2018.

A former Joliet public school teacher, Kazecki now lives at his mother's house in Oak Lawn. He has remained free, awaiting trial, for five years and four months.

Kazecki, the former Washington Junior High School teacher for Joliet Public School District 86, will finally stand trial at the end of February on his first-degree murder charges following the Aug. 7, 2018 death of his wife, Becky (Brackenrich) Kazecki.

Prosecutors have told the judge that Michael Kazecki punched, kicked and struck his wife over the course of three days, from Aug. 4 to 6, 2018. The Kazeckis lived in the 700 block of McDonough Street on Joliet's near west side.

In 2018, Will County Republican Judge Ben Braun objected to the arguments put forth by the Will County State's Attorney's Office, and Braun set Michael Kazecki's bail at $2 million, rather than the $5 million prosecutors sought.

After three weeks in Will County's Jail, Kazecki walked out of the building on Aug. 30, 2018 after his mother posted 10 percent, which was $200,000, to regain her son's freedom. Kazecki's family retained private counsel, attorney Nathaniel Tate of the downtown Joliet law offices of Edward Jaquays.

Trial date: Feb. 26, 2024 in Courtroom 402 of Judge Daniel Rippy; Jan. 16 is listed on the court docket for "setting a hearing."

Shanquilla Garvey, incarcerated by Joliet police on Dec. 20, 2017.

Garvey is accused of throwing her 9-month-old daughter Cherish Freemaninto a set of dresser drawers and on to the ground at the Bel-Air Motel on Joliet's Plainfield Road and then shaking Cherish, causing the death of the little girl. A former Bolingbrook resident, Garvey and her children lived at the Bel-Air. Garvey's murder case has been scheduled for a jury trial numerous times over the past two years, but on every occasion, the trial was delayed.

Trial date: Garvey's latest jury trial is set for March 25, 2024, in Courtroom 402 of Will County Judge Dan Rippy.

Christopher Beale, let out of the Will County Jail in late November.

Beale, a Joliet first-degree murder defendant who lived in the Will County Jail for more than five years, is no longer staying in Will County's Jail after a Republican judge from Plainfield, Daniel Rippy, agreed to set him free.

In November, citing the new SAFE-T-Act, Beale convinced Rippy to let him remain free while he awaits his jury trial for the deadly stabbing of 28-year-old Marcedes "Marci" Flakes. After receiving Rippy's permission, on Nov. 22, Beale walked out of the Will County Jail for the first time since his arrest on Oct. 1, 2018.

Flakes lived at the now-demolished Fairview housing projects in Joliet's Forest Park area of the east side. She died of a stab wound that pierced her heart, collapsing near the street.

Two days before Judge Rippy let Beale out of jail, the Joliet murder defendant acting as his own lawyer filed several pages of court documents, arguing he acted in self-defense when he took the life of his estranged girlfriend.

"First, the defendant's knowledge of the victim's violent tendencies necessarily affects his perceptions of and reactions to the victim's behavior," Beale wrote the judge. "The same deadly force that would be unreasonable in an altercation with a presumably peaceful citizen may be reasonable in response to similar behavior by a man of known violent and aggressive tendencies ... Second, evidence of the victim's propensity for violence tends to support the defendant's version of the facts where there are conflicting accounts of what happened."

Trial date: April 22, 2024, in Courtroom 402, pretrial hearing is set for Feb. 2.

Amari Morgan, brother of convicted killer Blaique Morgan, incarcerated by the Will County Sheriff's Office since January 2016. The Morgans lived in the 1700 block of Houston Avenue, in Joliet Township's Preston Heights area.

In January 2016, Will County Sheriff's detectives raided Amari Morgan's house and found Post-It notes in his bedroom. Several identical Post-It notes were found scattered in the nearby yards along Houston Avenue near the body of murder victim Bob Bielec, the 62-year-old neighbor of the Morgan brothers.

These outdoor Post-It notes all read: "Reap What You Sow."

"I had nothing to do with that," Blaique Morgan told sheriff's detectives.

The detectives told Blaique Morgan this was a brutal murder. The victim had died in his driveway of a severe beating from a baseball bat. "It sounds bad, but the facts are not that," Morgan told them. "But a murder? Again, I did not do that."

Morgan said the "Reap What You Sow" Post-It notes were scattered outside, prior to their driveway confrontation with Bielec. He suggested his brother Amari could have made them.

"My brother, he's not been a subliminal person," Blaique told the detectives.

Trial date: Amari Morgan has been working with his attorney Jeff Tomczak of The Tomczak Law Group. The trial is set to begin on Jan. 29 in Courtroom 404 of Judge Vincent Cornelius and a hearing is set for Jan. 4.

Jonathan Middono of Channahon, killed his own child back on June 2, 2019, according to Will County prosecutors.

Back in February, Joliet Patch reported that after being lodged in Will County's Jail for close to four years, Jonathon Middono is taking a more active role in his first-degree murder case as he stands accused of killing his baby girl, Kora, back on June 2, 2019.

Middono submitted a motion, stating he is requesting a new court date for the following reasons: he claims the Will County Public Defender's Office has not issued his court ordered copy of discovery, refuses to see him and lied about why not to go to a bench trial. According to Middono's motion, he was requesting to change from a jury trial to a bench trial and "that date will be set after I have had time to go through my discovery."

Now 34 years old, Jonathan Middono has remained in the Will County Jail facing first-degree murder charges since Channahon police arrested him June 3, 2019.

Trial date: Middono is now set to begin his trial in Courtroom 503 of Judge Carmen Goodman on April 29.

Abraham Bibian, and a Joliet woman, Paola Diaz, are both charged with first-degree murder in the April 4, 2021, deadly shooting of Jwaun Latrell Jones, who was 18. Bibian is also charged with aggravated unlawful use of a weapon.

According to court documents, Jones was fatally shot in the head as he sat inside a vehicle driving westbound on Western Avenue at North Bluff Street. The Joliet homicide was near the Cass Street Bridge over the Des Plaines River. Joliet police detectives do not believe Jones was the intended target of the shooter. Police reports reflect that Bibian aimed his rifle in the direction of the vehicle with several occupants, including Jones, who sat in the backseat.

Over the past three years, Bibian has worked closely with his counsel, downtown Joliet criminal defense attorney Chuck Bretz. Recently, Bretz filed several motions pursuing an angle that someone else's gun took the life of Jones. On the other hand, Will County prosecutors filed court documents in May of 2021, implicating Bibian as the killer. "An individual, later learned to be defendant Abraham Bibian, is seen shooting a rifle at the victim's car. Defendant Bibian admitted to police he fired the weapon on the night of this murder."

Trial date: Bibian, who now lives back at his family's home in the 1200 block of Edge Hill Avenue and remains under GPS electronic monitoring, has a hearing Jan. 10 in Courtroom 405 of Judge Carlson. The purpose of that hearing is listed as setting for trial.

Joshua Topaz Anderson, boyfriend of Illinois prison inmate Bobbie Ollom.

A Chicago resident, Anderson was mentioned in Tuesday's Joliet Patch exclusive story examining the details of the late April 2019 Denny's restaurant parking lot murder of Gregory Brown, 36, of Crest Hill.

Brown died once he got into the car of Anderson's girlfriend, under the belief he would pay her $850 for oral sex, but within three seconds of entering the car, someone fatally shot him, according to the Joliet police investigation. Anderson and his cousin, Chris Parker, have both remained in the Will County Jail since May 2019. Ollom is now serving an 18-year prison term for her role in the crime.

Trial date: Anderson is set to return to Courtroom 502 of Judge Amy Bertani-Tomczak on Jan. 4 for the setting of his trial date.

Anderson has used his time in the Will County Jail focused on filing lawsuits against the public officials in charge of his well-being. In July of 2022, Joliet Patch reported that Anderson filed another lawsuit, this one alleges Anderson found a staple in his cereal that April.

"When plaintiff tried to grab this staple, it slipped to the bottom of his cereal bowl. Plaintiff then walked directly to the drain by the phones, poured the milk out of his cereal and was able to grab the staple, hold it up to the dayroom camera and give it to deputy A. Rodriguez," Anderson's lawsuit contends. According to Anderson's pro se lawsuit, "plaintiff could have died if he would have mistakenly eaten the staple, and that would have greatly caused plaintiff's family anxiety and stress.

In June 2021, Patch reported that Anderson filed a lawsuit against the Will County Jail, Sheriff Mike Kelley, Warden Dale Santarelli and an unknown booking sergeant. "I was denied upon request the basic hygiene items that the rule book on page 2 states should be given to inmates upon arrival: toothbrush, toothpaste, soap, towel and no mattresses and was told to shut the f*** up, you don't need a mattress, by the correctional officer whose name is unknown," Anderson's lawsuit states. "He was white, older, looked to be around 60 with glasses. On his break he also told the correctional officer who was relieving him ... that if I asked for a mattress not to give it to me."

Chris Parker, cousin of Joshua Anderson, is also charged with first-degree murder in the April 2019 killing of Denny's restaurant patron Gregory Brown, 36, of Crest Hill.

Also from Chicago, Parker has lived in the Will County Jail since May 8, 2019.

Trial date: Parker is set to have his jury trial starting May 6, 2024 in Courtroom 502 of Judge Amy Bertani-Tomczak.

Deiontae Shawnrico McMillian, in November 2018, the Will County Sheriff's Department announced that a 24-year-old man from Fayetteville, North Carolina has been charged in the death of a 22-year-old woman found in the woods near Woodlawn Memorial Park off West Jefferson Street in Joliet Township.

McMillian was charged with concealment of a homicidal death and first-degree murder in the strangulation of Danica Shernay Ford, mother of two, of Concord, North Carolina. McMillian was taken into custody back in North Carolina.

Trial date: McMillian is set to be the first murder trial for 2024 at the Will County Courthouse. McMillian's jury trial is set to begin next week, on Jan. 2, in Courtroom 503 of Judge Carmen Goodman.

Jorge Rosas Jr., four days after a 25-year-old Romeoville man was gunned down inside his parked car in Joliet's St. Patrick's Neighborhood in October 2020, Joliet police arrested 41-year-old Joliet resident Jorge Rosas Jr.

Rosas faces three counts of first-degree murder, plus aggravated discharge of a gun and unlawful possession of a weapon by a convicted felon. At 12:01 a.m., Ivan Perez-Garcia of Romeoville was killed inside his car parked in the 100 block of Seeser Street.

Trial date: In 2021, Joliet Patch reported that criminal defense attorney Chuck Bretz has severed ties with his client Rosas, who Joliet Patch previously reported has been involved in cocaine dealing and was a 2-6 street gang member as recently as 2014, according to Will County prosecutors.

According to Bretz's motion, "Jorge Rosas Jr. has substantially failed to fulfill his obligation as to the fees agreed upon, between himself and the law firm of Bretz, Flynn & Associates for representation of him/her in the above referenced matters."

Now 45 years old, Rosas has his jury trial set to begin on April 15, 2024 in Courtroom 402 of Judge Rippy, and there is a pretrial hearing set for Feb. 21.

Rosas came from the 100 block of Joliet's Baker Avenue. He has remained in the Will County Jail since Joliet police arrested him Oct. 28, 2020, three years and two months ago.