Alleged threat can be heard

Originally published Friday, May 18, 2007

A DuPage County judge ruled Thursday that a death threat Eric Hanson is accused of making six weeks before four family members were found slain in Aurora may be used at trial.

His surviving sibling, Jennifer Williams, told authorities that her sister complained Eric threatened to kill her if she exposed his credit card fraud to their father.

Authorities allege Hanson made good on that threat in September 2005, when he fatally beat his sister Kate and her husband, Jimmy Tsao, and later shot his parents.

DuPage County Circuit Judge Robert Anderson ruled Thursday that the alleged Aug. 13, 2005, threat may be allowed as evidence in the 30-year-old Naperville man's trial next year.

Prosecutors plan to seek the death penalty if Hanson is convicted of committing the quadruple homicide to hide that he stole $80,000.

At the core of Thursday's ruling was the defendant's constitutionally protected right to confront his accuser in court.

Prosecutors argued he forfeited that right when he killed his sister Kate, but the defense countered he has not been convicted and letting a jury consider such "hearsay" evidence is too prejudicial.

In his ruling, Anderson said the law recognizes the forfeiture argument. He said a 2004 U.S. Supreme Court decision further limiting the use of hearsay statements does not apply to the forfeiture doctrine.

Hanson denies involvement in the quadruple homicide, which was discovered in the Tsaos' home in an upscale Aurora neighborhood.

Authorities obtained an arrest warrant within hours of the grisly discovery, alleging Hanson had threatened to kill Kate if she told their father her brother had stolen $80,000 from their parents in a credit card scheme she and her mother discovered.

Jennifer Williams testified last month that Kate telephoned to tell her she and their mother discovered tens of thousands of dollars in credit card purchases. She said Kate told her Eric admitted it when confronted April 13, 2005, and agreed to make restitution.

Kate Hanson-Tsao never told her father. But six weeks later, 31-year-old Kate and her husband, Jimmy Tsao, 34, were found beaten to death in their home on Jeremy Ranch Court in the White Eagle subdivision.

The bodies of her parents, 57-year-old Terrance and 55-year-old Mary Hanson, also were discovered in the home. The parents, with whom Eric Hanson lived in Naperville, were fatally shot.

A state trooper stopped Eric Hanson's Chevrolet Trail Blazer near Portage, Wis., about noon the next day, Sept. 30, 2005, after he returned from a 24-hour trip to Los Angeles.

DuPage County Public Defender Robert Miller said prosecutors lack a confession or the murder weapons. But prosecutor Robert Berlin said police found a glove in Hanson's SUV that had traces of his slain father's blood, as well as Jimmy Tsao's Rolex and Kate's diamond wedding ring. Berlin said the jewelry and Hanson's shoes also contained DNA evidence.

As for the alleged threat, Berlin said prosecutors have a jailhouse letter Hanson wrote to a cousin in which he admits it.