The first trial in the high-profile mob beating deaths of two men after a van crash last summer on the South Side is moving forward with jury selection to begin Tuesday.
Lamont Motes, 20, will be the first of eight suspects to be tried in the fatal beating of Jack Moore, 62, and Anthony Stuckey, 49, after their van crashed into a group of women in the Oakland neighborhood.
The trial will begin less than six months after the crime–warp speed for the Criminal Courts Building, where attorneys in major cases are known to exchange motions for years in the pretrial equivalent of trench warfare.
The quick pace can be attributed to Motes’ defense attorney, Frank Himel, who has chosen to declare his side ready for trial in an effort to force Cook County prosecutors to proceed with what he believes is a weak case.
Motes faces life in prison if convicted.
