Cops: Driver accused of murder trying to ram squad car
Ed Diamond stayed put.
Throughout the three days of testimony in the murder trial of the man behind the wheel of the U-Haul truck that killed his son Corey two years ago, Diamond served as a sort of bulwark for friends and family members of Elliott Cellini and Brandon Forshall, the surviving victims of the horrific July 2006 crash in Wheeling.
Diamond sat in his first-row aisle seat Thursday in the Rolling Meadows courtroom with his wife, Melanie, and Cellini's mother, Allyson, listening to witnesses describe what happened the day his son lost his life and Elliott lost his independence.
Melanie Diamond sat with her head buried in Allyson Cellini's shoulder. Ed Diamond pinched the bridge of his nose, rubbed his palm against his eyes and held his wife's hand against his jittering left leg.
As prosecutors prepared to play a tape of the crash taken from the dashboard recorder of Buffalo Grove police officer Keith Bourbonnais' patrol car, Melanie Diamond and her daughter left the courtroom, unable to watch.
Ed Diamond stayed. That's what fathers do.
Someone else stayed. A woman who declined to give her name sat for the last two days in the back row of the courtroom. Except for public defenders Helen Tsimouris and Calvin Aguilar who briefly acknowledged her after court adjourned Thursday, she appeared to be the only person with a connection to 28-year-old Ralph Lewis, charged with first-degree murder, unlawful restraint, aggravated battery and aggravated possession of a stolen motor vehicle.
No one spoke to her, and she spoke to no one.
She sat, arms across her chest, head occasionally in hand, as prosecutors Tom Byrne, Karen Crothers and Steve Rosenblum played the videotape that concluded an emotional day of testimony in the trial that began Tuesday with testimony from Melanie Diamond; 19-year-old Forshall, the passenger who miraculously walked away from the wreckage; and Elliott Cellini, the changed yet determined survivor who has regained some of his strength but not his memories.
The state called the police technician who collected evidence that placed Lewis at the scene, the medical examiner who conducted the autopsy, the paramedic who treated Cellini at the scene and the physician who detailed the young man's long road to recovery and the miles he has to go. Also taking the stand was Cordellro Webb, whose drug debt, he testified, Lewis said he'd pay, and a childhood friend on whom he said Lewis tried to pin the crash. Then the cell phone salesperson who agreed to dinner and got caught up in a crime testified, as did sales associates at stores from which Lewis is accused of stealing, and the head cashier at the Gurnee Home Depot who became suspicious of Lewis' license and alerted Gurnee police.
There was the U-Haul clerk who rented the truck, and the real Taylor Thode, the Chicago woman whose identity Lewis is accused of stealing to finance his credit-card thefts. The Gurnee police officer who followed the truck down I-94 where witnesses say Lewis began his high-speed tear through the Northwest suburbs testified. The Lincolnshire police officers who pursued the speeding U-Haul after it left the expressway and clocked the truck doing 80 mph down Milwaukee Avenue before the crash at Dundee and Schoenbeck roads.
Seven motorists described how they feared for their lives as the truck bore down on them at speeds estimated between 50 and 80 mph.
On Thursday, Buffalo Grove police officers Randall A. Smith and Richard Hyland told how they picked up the pursuit on Lake-Cook Road. Officer Tara Romano broke down testifying that Lewis aimed the U-Haul at her patrol car, and that she escaped injury by driving onto the curb.
Regaining her composure, she described chasing and arresting Lewis after the truck crashed into Cellini's Ford Taurus. Bourbonnais, an 18-year veteran and the first officer on the scene, spoke quietly as he described the unconscious teenage boys in the front seat of the car whose mangled passenger door was pushed into the center console.
Together, 29 witnesses testified for the prosecution before the state concluded its case Thursday. No testimony was heard for the defense.
Lewis, who faces 20 to 60 years in prison if convicted of first-degree murder, exercised his right to keep silent. The defense, which contends this should not be a murder case, called no witnesses.
Both sides present closing arguments today.