What began as a routine trial of a rape case in the Markham courthouse ended last week with a scenario that resembled something created by a television or movie script writer.
Testifying in the trial of Edwin Evans, 17, on a rape charge, defense witness Frank Tolbert, 18, stunned prosecutors by telling the jury that he, not Evans, had assaulted the victim.
But despite Tolbert`s ”confession,” a jury in the courtroom of Cook County Circuit Judge Matthew Moran Thursday night found Evans, of 834 W. 111th St., guilty of aggravated criminal sexual assault and unlawful restraint in the July 5, 1984, rape of a 14-year-old girl.
As the verdict was read, Evans fell forward in a faint, breaking his eyeglasses. He tumbled to the floor, then awoke and began crying.
A woman believed to be Evans` mother ran forward and fell over the railing separating spectators from the front of the courtroom. She stood up, followed by several of Evans` friends, who were shouting and waving their arms.
A squad of sheriff`s bailiffs restored order, and Moran set sentencing for Feb. 20.
Prosecutors Deborah Dooling and John Eannace said they would investigate the statement by Tolbert, a student at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale.
Tolbert testified that he was in Evans` house with the girl and had been drinking beer and smoking ”funny cigarettes.” He said he made ”a pass” at the girl and then ”jumped on her.”
But at the time, and again during the trial, the girl identified Evans as her assailant.
The girl`s testimony was supported by a girlfriend, who said she stood outside the house pounding on the front door when she heard the victim crying upstairs. She said the girl told her she had been raped by Evans.
The prosecutors said it was the first time they had encountered a witness who confessed on the stand to a crime for which he was not charged.
”This was certainly a most odd occurrence,” Dooling said. ”I would think he was just trying to take his buddy out of it.”
