Chicago Tribune from Chicago, Illinois • Page 2-3

3 NRWCHICAGO TRIBUNE METRO SECTION2 A California man who was the ringleader of an operation that defrauded DuPage County banks was sentenced Tuesday to 12 years in prison. Faramarz Kiasi, 48, of Anaheim, was convicted earlier this year of operating a continuing financial crimes enterprise in which the four people he enlisted in his scheme were flown to the Chicago area in 2006, said Assistant Atty. Ken Tatarelis. They were instructed on how to open business accounts at area financial institutions using stolen identities of California residents, deposit counterfeit checks into those accountsand begin to withdraw cash, Tatarelis said. orchestrated really hundreds of crimes, and Naperville police did a fantastic job of nipping this Judge Michael Burke said.

and simply, you are a scam The four other participants all pleaded guilty earlier to lesser financial crimes, with two getting 4-month County Jail sentences and 2 years of probation, and two others getting 4-year prison terms. Kiasi also was ordered to pay about $65,000 in restitution. Leader of bank-fraud ring gets 12 years DUPAGE COUNTY A Plainfield man faces up to 5 years in prison after pleading guilty Tuesday to stealing a $1,500 Pomeranian puppy from a Naperville pet store in March. Emanuel Lopez, 19, is to be sentenced July 2 by DuPage County Judge John Kinsella. Lopez participated in a plot to steal the red-sable puppy with Marquez Anais and Karlie Pellock, both 19and of Plainfield, and sell it for Assistant Atty.

Mary Cronin. Both women, who worked at the Petland store where the animal was stolen March 21, have been charged with misdemeanor conspiracy. The puppy was returned to the store in good health March 24. Man admits stealing $1,500 pup at store DUPAGE COUNTY Jurors weighing the evidence against political insider Antoin Rezko scheduled extra work time this week after once again wrapping up just a half-day of deliberations Tuesday. One juror who needed to get to a job interview was the reason for the latest early adjournment, said a note from the panel to U.S.

District Judge Amy St. Eve. The same note promised that jurors would work until 5:50 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday. Deliberations normally end about 4:30 p.m.

The panel of 10 women and 2 men has needed about two weeks to work just 5 1 2 days because of holidays, scheduling problems and other days off. Jurors heard the end of closing arguments and chose a foreman May 13. Rezko jury schedules extra time to work CHICAGO Two Chicago executives have been charged with conspiring to illegally import honey from China, federal authorities announced Tuesday. Two executives of Alfred L. Wolff Inc.

were accused of knowingly bringing in honey contaminated with an antibiotic banned by the Food and Drug Administration, according to the U.S. office. Stefanie Giesselbach, 30, of Chicago and Magnus von Buddenbrock, 32, of Chicago were both charged. Prosecutors said the honey was mislabeled as coming from other countries. 2 illegally imported honey, officials say CHICAGO By Maurice Possley TRIBUNE REPORTER DNA tests have exonerated a South Side man who has served nearly 14 years in prison in the sexual assault of a 15-year-old girl who was attacked in the fall of 1994 as she walked to school, the lawyer said Tuesday.

Dean Cage, 41, was convicted by a jury and sentenced to 40 years in prison despite his assertions that he was innocent and was home at the time of the attack. have my life Cage said in a telephone interview with the Tribune from the Illinois River Correctional Center in Downstate Canton. means the world to me. I never had a doubt. I am happy and Attorney Peter Neufeld, co-found- er of the New York-based Innocence Project, which investigates wrongful convictions, said he was informed by the Cook County office that conviction had been dismissed after DNA tests eliminated him as the attacker.

Cage was to be released as soon as Tuesday night. The exoneration by DNA is the 29th such case in Illinois. The case is another example of an erroneous eyewitness identification leading to a wrongful conviction, said Alba Morales, an Innocence Project attorney who has been working on case for several years. More than three-fourths of the wrongful convictions uncovered by DNA testing have involved faulty eyewitness testimony, she said. And, like case, many of those involved composite sketches of suspects.

After the assault, the victim provided a description of her attacker and a computer-generated composite sketch was circulated in the neighborhood. About a week later, an anonymous tipster called police and said that a possible suspect worked at a meat-packing house nearby. The victim identified Cage at the business as her attacker. After a lineup, Cage was charged with participating in a separate rape that took place in February 1994, according to John Gorman, a spokesman for the attorney. A 29- year-old woman said that Cage and two other men grabbed her, and that one raped her.

She could not identify the rapist. After DNA tests failed to link Cage to the rape, he was acquitted in 1995 in a bench trial by Circuit Judge Michael Bolan. The next year Cage went to trial before Bolan on the Nov. 14, 1994, rape charge. The victim in that case testified that she had missed her bus and was walking to a train station about 6:25 a.m.

when a man grabbed her, dragged her and sexually assaulted her between two porches of an apartment building near 70th Street and Wabash Avenue. Cage testified at the trial that he did not leave his home that morning until about 7:30 a.m. had never been locked up a day in my Cage said Tuesday. was just trying to support my family. But my mother said everything happens for a reason, that it happened to put me closer to the Father, to make me a stronger The Innocence Project began reinvestigating the case in 2004.

Initial DNA tests were not definitive, and another round of tests, completed recently him as the attacker. On Tuesday morning, Chief Criminal Court Judge Paul Biebel dismissed the case at the request. After 14 years, DNA frees inmate Tests clear man in 1994 rape of teenager Dean Cage By Robert Mitchum and Jason Meisner TRIBUNE REPORTERS The warm, humid night that concluded Memorial Day weekend had drawn groups of teenagers outside to gather at corners, hang out with friends and celebrate the start of summer on South Side. But close to 11 p.m., as the socializing was winding down, a burst of gunfire sliced through the stuffy air and scattered one group of teens at the corner of 69th Place and South Dorchester Avenue. When the shots faded, 15-year-old Sharkelia Taylor, who had come back to Chicago from Garyfor the weekend to visit her grandmother and friends, was left on the ground with a gunshot wound in her back.

Latisha Coleman, who lives across the street from the corner, heard the gunfire and then found cousin at her door, saying Taylor had been shot. walked over there and saw the little girl on the It was terrible. She was trying to speak. I kept telling her to stop Coleman said. was holding my hand and I was talking to her, saying, with me, stay with the little girl took two whole breaths and let go of my hand.

I said, gone. Taylor was the youngest of several shooting victims Monday night as the holiday turned violent in South Shore community area. Between 8 and 11 p.m., three separate shootings within 2 1 2 miles left Taylor and 27-year-old Frederick Hogan dead and four others wounded. Police and witnesses said that the shots were fired from a black Chevrolet Monte Carlo that sped past the corner shortly before 11 p.m. Monday night.

It was unknown who the intended target of the shooting was. Another woman, who was shot in the leg during the incident and taken to Stroger Hospital in good condition, was recovering at home Tuesday, family members said. Earlier in the evening, Hoganof the 7200 block of South Marquette Avenuewas shot five times while standing on a sidewalk around 8 p.m. in the 7800 block of South Essex Avenue. He died en route to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, according to the Cook County medical office.

Tribune photo by Michael Tercha Latisha Coleman was alerted by Sharkelia cousin that the girl, visiting from Gary, had been shot. Teen fatally shot on South Side 15-year-old girl was visiting from Gary Despite concerns from some residents, the Downers Grove Park District will proceed with plans to build two T-Mobile cell phone towers in Hummer and Gilbert Parks. The Village Council voted 4-2 at the May 20 meeting to approve a special-use permit for the Park District. Commissioner Sean Durkin was absent from the meeting. The Hummer Park tower will be about 75 feettall and will double as a flagpole.

The Gilbert Park tower will be about 90 feet tall and will be built on a part of unincorporated DuPage County that the council voted to annex. Several residents expressed concern about blight, safety and improper use of public land at a village workshop meeting earlier this month. Council members Marilyn Schnell and William Waldack opposed the ordinance. Mayor Ron Sandack said the village is not in a position to consider the policy decisions of the Park District. a tough call.

But the Park District is a separately elected and they are in charge of the parks. They are the ones who make the policy Sandack said. Plan OKd for 2 cell phone towers By Erika Slife TRIBUNE REPORTER On the day Craig Stebic was to respond in court to allegations that he had threatened his wife before she disappeared last year, his attorney announced Tuesday that they had offered to settle a lawsuit initiated by her family for visitation rights with the children. Though the terms of the offer were not disclosed, the announcement in Will County Court brought a sigh of relief for the missing Plainfield relatives, who have waged a legal battle against Craig Stebic since November to have the court appoint a counselor to meet with them and the children. said Melanie Greenberg, a spokeswoman for Lisa family, in describing the state of mind after hearing about the offer.

children, who are 13 and 11, are all that we have left of Lisa. constantly on our minds: Are they all right? cautiously hopeful that something will be worked Lisa was 37 when she was last seen, by Craig, on April 30, 2007, at the Plainfield home. She and her husband had begun divorce proceedings, and on the day she disappeared, she had mailed her lawyer a petition seeking to evict Craig. Police have identified him as a of in the case. He has denied any wrongdoing.

In November, parents, Lawrence and Judith Ruttenberg, and her grandparents, Milton and Charlotte Ruttenberg, filed a petition for visitation rights. Craig Stebic said he would allow his family to visit with the children under his supervision, an offer the Ruttenbergs have shunned. In court papers filed this month, the Ruttenbergs have claimed Steb- ic is an unfit parent and has on separate occasions threatened to kill them, his wife and their chil- dren. They also accused him of being intoxicated while supervising the use of his weapons, and of making his own and allowing his children to taste it. On Tuesday, Craig attorney, Dion Davi, was to file his objections to questions centering on those allegations.

The Rutten- attorney, Timothy Daw, said his office got the settlement offer Friday. As of Tuesday morning, he yet seen it. Stebic offers to settle visitation battle Missing family hopes to see her 2 kids Ruttenberg family photo Lisa Stebic (left) in 2002 with her parents, Lawrence and Judith Ruttenberg. Stebic of Plainfield has been missing since April 30, 2007. By Jo Napolitano TRIBUNE REPORTER The superintendent of Oak Park and River Forest High School District 200 twice in recent days has apologized to faculty, staff and students for not crediting Republican presidential candidate John McCain for a story the superintendent shared in a Memorial Day address last week.

Attila J. Weninger, who was emceeing the Memorial Day celebration Thursday, commented that his brother had served in the Air Force. Weninger said he then went straight into essay about being a Vietnam prisoner of war, never attributing it to the Arizona senator. McCain, a former Navy pilot who was a POW for 5 1 2 years, has often told the story of a fellow POW beaten for sewing an American flag into a shirt. Because Weninger introduce the story properly, he said, some in the audience were left believing that he was saying his brother wrote the story.

was done Weninger said. written down. When I made the reference to my brother and then read the story, some people thought I was attributing the story to my brother. It was an error in my part not to introduce the story in a better or more clear The superintendent, who was hired last summer, sent out a clarifying e-mail to students and faculty Friday and made a similar announcement over the public address system Tuesday. suppose that everybody could Monday-morning quarterback anything that anybody he said.

mistake was in going off script and trying to introduce a story and to reference the fact that I had a relative in the armed forces in an ineloquent way. I have apologized for He explained a student had sent story to him and to several other administrators more than a week earlier. Weninger said he chose not to say in his remarks that McCain had authored it because he want to the assembly. Schools chief fails to credit McCain story A woman was struck and killed Tuesday morning by a Metra train at a crossing in Western Springs. The woman, 21, whose identity was not released pending notification of her family, was walking alone at the crossing near Lawn and Hillgrove Avenues near the Western Springs Metra station, when she was struck at about 7:45 a.m., said Deputy Police Chief Brian Budds.

Her death appears accidental, he said, although the gates and warning lights at the street-level crossing were fully functional. The woman was pronounced dead at the scene, said the Cook County medical office. Woman, 21, is hit, killed by Metra train WESTERN SPRINGS Product: CTMETRO PubDate: 05-28-2008 Zone: NRW Edition: SPC Page: METROP3-3 User: croyer Time: Color:.