Trying to sustain the murder conviction that became the “crown jewel” of his career may have cost an assistant state’s attorney his reputation, his job and his freedom when he covered up his close friendship with a key witness, prosecutors said Wednesday.
Nicholas Trutenko was “scheming and cunning” to hide the relationship, prosecutors said in their closing arguments in an unusual case with roots dating to the 1980s and links to allegations of police torture in the investigation of the high-profile murders of two Chicago police officers.
Trutenko, 69, was an assistant state’s attorney in 2020 when he testified at the third murder trial of Jackie Wilson, who was allegedly tortured into confessing to the 1982 murder of Chicago police officers Richard O’Brien and William Fahey.
In a career-making case, Trutenko had been the prosecutor in Wilson’s second trial in 1989 and arranged the testimony of William Coleman in exchange for a plea deal in two of Coleman’s pending cases. The convictions of Wilson and his brother Andrew had been overturned based on allegations they had been torured by detectives working under the notorious Cmdr. Jon Burge.
The brothers were later convicted again, and Andrew Wilson died in prison in 2007. Coleman’s testimony involved things the brothers had allegedly told him while they all were in Cook County Jail.
But in Jackie Wilson’s final trial in 2020, Trutenko revealed on the witness stand that he had a longtime friendship with Coleman. The relationship was so close that Coleman, a British con artist, chose Trutenko to be his daughter’s godfather.
The courtroom erupted that day in 2020, Trutenko was later fired from the state’s attorney’s office, and he eventually was charged with perjury, obstruction of justice, official misconduct and violating a local records act. Andrew Horvat, who represented Trutenko in the 2020 case, is also charged with official misconduct.
“Their actions based on their choices were shocking and criminal,” special prosecutor David Hoffman said in closing statements Wednesday, calling the relationship between Coleman and Trutenko “scheming and cunning.”
Trutenko’s defense team also closed its case Wednesday, seeking to cast Trutenko as an honest and forthcoming man who would have revealed his relationship with Coleman if he had been asked the right questions. Any falsehoods he said while on the stand in 2020 were the result of his being flustered or misspeaking, not an intentional lie, the defense argued.
The final day of trial was a marathon day of exhaustive statements from attorneys on both sides, with Judge Daniel Shanes interrupting to ask questions about each side’s argument. The case is a bench trial, meaning there is no jury and Shanes alone will decide to convict or acquit the defendants.
Throughout closing statements, a few key differences emerged between the prosecution and defense.
The defense argued it was the prosecution’s witnesses who were not credible — including the special prosecutors who charged and tried Wilson in 2020 before charges were dropped in part due to Trutenko’s botched testimony. Trutenko’s attorney, James McKay, repeatedly called the prosecution’s witnesses and prosecutors in the Wilson case “lazy” and “incompetent,” arguing that they should be the ones indicted.
The prosecution countered that many of their witnesses were lawyers themselves with knowledge of the law and reputations for credibility.
And prosecutors argued that Trutenko intentionally concealed his relationship with Coleman, lying under oath about a 2020 pretrial meeting where Coleman was discussed. More than half of the pretrial meeting was spent discussing Coleman, who was presumed dead at the time and unable to testify, former assistant state’s attorneys Larry Rosen and Paul Fangman previously testified in Trutenko’s trial. When asked in 2020, Trutenko said Coleman’s name didn’t come up in that meeting.
But Trutenko had been in contact with Coleman and knew he wasn’t dead. He was alive in England, and he had recently emailed him about a 2020 presidential debate, Trutenko testified in 2020. Prosecutors argued Trutenko should have known his relationship with Coleman was relevant to the case and disclosed it, but his defense said it was the responsibility of the attorneys on the case to ask him.
But the prosecutors, led by Lawrence Oliver II, made the distinction that Trutenko’s relationship with Coleman wasn’t illegal, but keeping it under wraps was. Prosecutors also argued that Trutenko was responsible for disclosing his relationship with Coleman, citing past precedent that requires prosecutors to turn over all exculpatory evidence in a case. The defense countered that the precedent didn’t apply because Trutenko was no longer the prosecutor in Wilson’s case.
Trutenko is also accused of destroying public records when he asked his son for help deleting content from his work cellphone hours after being fired. Trutenko’s son, Joseph, performed a factory reset on his iPhone, which wipes all content and settings. Prosecutors argue that Trutenko knew what he was doing when wiping the phone, but the defense contends that Trutenko thought his professional communications were preserved on the county server and only wanted to delete personal contacts, photos and videos.
“We’ll never know what was on there because of his choice — Trutenko’s choice, not his son’s choice,” Hoffman said.
Prosecutors allege Trutenko’s co-defendant Horvat should have upheld his responsibility to disclose the information about Coleman and Trutenko’s ties when he learned of them the day before Trutenko’s testimony in 2020. Instead, he waited until Trutenko was on the stand to tell the prosecutors in that case, “Whatever you do, don’t ask him about his relationship with Coleman after 1989,” prosecutors argued in the current case.
In so doing, Horvat furthered the concealment that Trutenko had been conducting for weeks if not months, prosecutors said. Horvat’s defense attorney, Terry Ekl, said he was merely a “target” and prosecutors needed to manufacture a case against him.
“I do not believe this was a good faith prosecution,” Ekl said, adding that it was “driven by an agenda.”
A court date is expected in January for Shanes’ verdict.