With a judge poised to rule Thursday on whether Charles Green is entitled to a new sentencing hearing, or perhaps a new trial on charges of participating in a quadruple murder in 1985, sympathy and support for the only man still in prison for the crime has emerged from two unexpected quarters.
Green was 16 when police accused him of taking $25 to knock on the door of a West Side drug house, allowing two rival drug dealers to gain entrance and commit the murders. As the Tribune reported last month, one of those men was never tried and the other was freed in a plea deal after serving time.
Green, who is serving life in prison, says that he is innocent and that his youth worked against him in the appeals process.
Among those with a keen interest in Thursday’s hearing are Roberta Brooks, the mother of murder victims Kim and Yvonne Brooks, as well as other family members. Now living in Glendale, they were stunned to learn that Derrick House, the other man convicted of the murders, was released from prison and that Green was seeking a new trial.
“I feel sorry for Charles Green,” Brooks said. “He was just a kid when he went into prison.”
At the same time, another story has emerged that appears to support Green’s claim that the police got the wrong men in the murders.
Green’s petition for a new trial includes a sworn affidavit from Lonnie Haggins, a convicted thief and drug user, saying his brother Jeffery “Bodine” Haggins committed the murders with Charles Hill — not House and Teddy Bobo, the men accused by authorities.
Now another acquaintance of the Haggins family, a former Chicago man named Denis Thompson of Vancouver, says a third Haggins brother told him the same story.
Thompson told the Tribune that Dwayne Haggins “told me the whole story,” implicating Jeffrey Haggins and Hill. Dwayne Haggins, who now lives in Arkansas, declined to speak to the Tribune.
Jeffery “Bodine” Haggins and Hill have since died, underscoring the difficulties in untangling a 22-year-old crime.
Victims set afire
The case arises from the carnage of Jan. 12, 1985, when the Brooks sisters, as well as Raynard Rule and his sister, Lauren, were stabbed or shot and then set on fire with kerosene. At the time, police said House and Bobo were trying to collect a $300 debt from Rule, who sold narcotics.
Police said Green confessed to taking $25 from House to knock on the door and ask to buy drugs. When Rule opened the door, police said House and Bobo rushed in and killed Rule and the three women. House and Green were convicted, with Green getting a life term without parole because of his age and House getting a death sentence.
Authorities dropped charges against Bobo for lack of evidence after arresting him primarily on a statement made to police by Kim Brooks before she died that one of the murderers was a man named “Bo.”
Green’s lawyer, assistant Cook County public defender Timothy Leeming, contends that Green should get a new trial — as did House, who authorities said did the actual killing. On appeal, the Illinois Supreme Court reversed House’s conviction. House took a plea deal for a 40-year sentence and was released from prison last year.
Ruling expected
On Thursday, Circuit Court Judge Marjorie Laws is expected to rule on a petition that contends that Green was innocent of the crime and that he should either be given a new trial or a new sentencing hearing.
After reading the Tribune’s story about Green last month, Thompson contacted a reporter by e-mail. In an interview that followed, Thompson told the Tribune about his conversation with Dwayne Haggins that supports Green’s claim of mistaken identity, a conversation sparked by the story of Green’s continued incarceration.
“We were in the attic of his mother’s house,” Thompson recalled. “He asked me about Charles, and I told him he was still in prison. And that’s when he told me what happened.”
Thompson said, “He told me that [Jeffery Haggins] called him and asked him did he want to go on a caper with him, but he didn’t go. He told me it wasn’t supposed to be a murder. They — Charles Hill and him — were supposed to get some money.”
“He said it wouldn’t have been no problem if the dude [Rule] had listened,” Thompson said. “So he ended up getting stabbed, and then they had to kill the rest of the girls.” Thompson said Dwayne Haggins told him that clothing, a knife and a gun were dumped in the Garfield Park lagoon.
An effort by defense lawyers to introduce the theory of Jeffrey Haggins’ involvement at the original trial was barred by the judge as hearsay.
On Wednesday, Devine spokeswoman Tandra Simonton declined to comment on either Lonnie Haggins’ affidavit or Thompson’s account.
The possibility that Green and House were innocent is difficult for Brooks to grasp.
“I look to God for justice,” Brooks said in her daughter’s living room. “I could not say who was there and who was not. I remember being in that courtroom, and I looked at [Green’s and House’s] faces and I didn’t see any remorse. I never heard no apologies.”
Plea deal rejected
Though she sympathizes with Green, Brooks stops short of supporting his petition, because he rejected an offer to become a state witness in return for his freedom.
“He held the key to his fate,” Brooks said. “He had his chance to get out of it.”
Robert Egan, Green’s lawyer at the time, as well as John Gorman, spokesman for Cook County State’s Atty. Dick Devine, confirmed that Green rejected a deal to testify for the prosecution against House and the charges would be dropped.
Leeming contends that Green is innocent, that he was coerced into making a false confession and that he couldn’t have cooperated with prosecutors because “he didn’t know anything about what happened.”
Brooks realizes that if Green manages to win his freedom, she would be left with no one in prison for the murders of Kim and Yvonne.
“Not a day goes by that I don’t miss my girls,” said Brooks, 70. “And just as painful as it is to sit in a jail cell, it is painful for me to sit around without my girls. … But if he is innocent — I don’t want to see anyone behind bars who is innocent.”
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mpossley@tribune.com
