Verdict two weeks away for '96 murder of Aurora 6-year-old

A former Aurora gang boss must wait two weeks to learn if he's convicted or found not guilty in the death of a 6-year-old boy shot in a botched hit about 11 years ago.

Elias Diaz, 38, has been on trial since Monday in the Nov. 10, 1996, slaying of Nico Contreras, killed in his sleep after gang members fired seven bullets into a bedroom at his grandparents' house.

On April 18, Kane County Judge Timothy Sheldon is scheduled to issue a verdict in the pair of first-degree murder offenses Diaz faces.

Diaz is accused of ordering two members of his gang to assassinate a rival leader at the home, helping to get the handgun used in the shooting and acting as the getaway driver.

Earlier this week, Diaz testified he had nothing to do with the boy's death on the 600 block of Aurora Avenue.

Defense attorney Kathleen Colton said the former U.S. Marine and Gulf War veteran is being set up by gang members trying to deal their way out of unrelated offenses.

In closing arguments Friday, Colton called conflicting testimony by two paid informants a "train wreck ... and that's because it's based on a pack of lies."

But prosecutors say their case is solid, and backed up by secretly recorded conversations in which they say Diaz implicates himself in the allegations.

"Mr. Diaz thinks that because he didn't pull the trigger that he's not guilty, but that's not the law," prosecutor Sal LoPiccolo said in his closing argument.

Sheldon said he must review more than 100 pages of notes and several pieces of evidence before he can issue his verdict.

The alleged triggerman in the slaying, Mark Downs, has pleaded not guilty to similar offenses and is awaiting trial.