Three Are Charged in Murder Case That Led to Wrongful Convictions
CHICAGO — Prosecutors charged three men Wednesday with a 1978 double murder in which four other men had been wrongly convicted and imprisoned for nearly two decades.
The four walked out of court free but angry men Tuesday, and the next day prosecutors charged Juan Rodriguez and Ira Johnson, both 36, and Arthur Robinson, 42.
Also implicated in the crimes was Ira Johnson’s brother Dennis, who died in prison a few years ago.
Robinson was ordered held without bail pending a hearing on Friday. Ira Johnson is serving a 74-year sentence for another murder. Rodriguez remained at large, prosecutors said.
Carol Schmal and her fiance, Larry Lionberg, were abducted from a gas station and slain in 1978. Schmal was raped before she was killed.
But recent DNA evidence showed none of the men originally convicted could have raped Schmal, and information gathered by three Northwestern University journalism students and their professor led prosecutors to reevaluate the case.
Charges against a fourth man in the case, Verneal Jimerson, 43, who spent 11 years on death row, were dismissed last month.
The Northwestern team reexamined the case as part of a class project.
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