Third defendant sentenced in killing of widower
The third of four defendants charged in the 2011 murder of 55-year-old widower George Nellessen in his Arlington Heights home pleaded guilty to armed robbery Tuesday.
Marlon Green's guilty plea was part of an agreement with prosecutors which required that he testify against co-defendant Matthew Nellessen, George Nellessen's son.
Green, 24, was sentenced to 22 years in prison. He must serve at least 85 percent of his sentence before he is eligible for parole.
Prosecutors say Matthew Nellesen was motived by anger and greed to beat and stab his father to death on April 12, 2011, while George Nellessen was bound to a chair.
In March, jurors found Nellessen, 23, responsible for his father's death. They also found his actions to be brutal and heinous and indicative of wanton cruelty, prompting Cook County Judge Martin Agran to sentence Nellessen to life in prison without parole.
Matthew Nellessen planned to rob his father of money the younger Nellessen felt he was entitled to after the 2004 death of his mother, Laura Nellessen, George Nellessen's wife, prosecutors said. They said Nellessen enlisted help from Green, whom he met at Cook County jail.
Green, in turn, contacted his friend Armon Braden, 24, who agreed to help and who prosecutors say supplied the pellet gun used to intimidate the victim.
Braden, pleaded guilty last month to first-degree murder. He is expected to be sentenced on Jan. 30, 2015, to 22 years in prison in exchange for his plea.
Armon Braden's younger brother Azari Braden, 23, also was charged with first-degree murder in the case. Authorities say he drove his brother and Green to the Nellessen home on Wilshire Lane but never entered the residence. He next appears in court in January.
Green testified during Nellessen's trial that he never agreed to kill George Nellessen, a machinist at Rexam in Buffalo Grove, only that he would help rob him. Green said he and Armon Braden planned to rob Matthew Nellessen of the money stolen from his father.
Green admitted holding George Nellessen at gunpoint and eventually obtaining a password enabling him to transfer $100,000 from George Nellessen's home equity account into his savings account, after which they forced the victim to sign a $100,000 check made payable to his son.
After Matthew Nellessen saw the amount of money in his father's account he "went into a fit," said Green.
Matthew Nellessen then took $800 and some credit cards from his father's wallet, saying his father "never loved him and always loved his sister more," Green testified.
Nellessen retrieved a bat from the garage and struck his still-bound father in the head four or five times, saying "this is personal," Green said. After determining that his father still wasn't dead, Nellessen stabbed him in the neck with a kitchen knife, Green said.