Both sides in Lake Co. rape case ask for new rulings

Attorneys on both sides of the case against a Waukegan man accused of a 1986 rape asked a Lake County judge to rethink his rulings Tuesday.

Prosecutors asked the judge to reverse his decision of last month in the Bennie Starks case that bars them from using a transcript of the testimony of the victim, who has since died.

Defense attorneys, in turn, said they believe all of their client’s convictions related to the attack should be thrown out.

Starks, now 50, was convicted of aggravated criminal sexual assault, attempted aggravated criminal sexual assault and aggravated battery in the Jan. 18, 1986 rape of a 69-year-old woman in a Waukegan ravine.

Starks was sentenced to 60 years in prison, but a 2006 appellate court decision threw out the sex crime convictions because defense attorneys were barred from questioning the victim about her history of sexual contact before the attack.

The woman’s sexual activity in the time period around the attack became an issue in the case after DNA testing, performed after the first trial, established that Starks was not the source of semen found in the woman’s body and on her underwear.

Circuit Judge John Phillips ruled Jan. 5 that prosecutors could not read the woman’s testimony in the first trial to a jury in a second hearing because it would create the same circumstances for the defense that caused the first convictions to be reversed.

But Assistant State’s Attorney Michael Mermel asked Phillips on Tuesday to allow the woman’s transcript to be read at a new trial because prosecutors will concede Starks is not the donor of the semen.

Mermel said the woman’s identification of Starks as her attacker, her description of scratches she left on the rapist that match wounds Starks had when he was brought in for questioning in the case and other testimony should still be placed before a jury.

Waukegan defense attorney Jed Stone asked Phillips to change his ruling barring him from filing a challenge to Starks’ conviction for aggravated battery. The appellate court that reversed Starks’ rape convictions left that conviction in place.

Phillips said Jan. 5 that defense attorneys had waited too long after the appellate court ruling to mount a challenge of the aggravated battery conviction.

Phillips scheduled a hearing on both requests for March 1.