- Brian Jackson/Sun-Times Media
- An attorney for convicted heroin dealer Jason Austin, shown here in 2008, says witnesses against him committed perjury.
Who told the truth, and who didn’t?
The central problem is that either police or the key witness in the case—or both—committed perjury, attorney Richard Kling argues in a brief filed last week.
U.S. attorney Zachary Fardon called the 35-year sentence “a modest measure of justice” for the families of police detective Robert Soto and social worker Kathryn Romberg, who were shot while sitting in an SUV in West Humboldt Park on August 13, 2008. “We are gratified that the court found Austin responsible,” Fardon said.
Austin was convicted in 2012 of distributing less than 100 grams of heroin. But his sentencing last year focused almost exclusively on the murders, which prosecutors wanted to pin on him as a way of ensuring a lengthy prison term.
Lefkow acknowledged these issues but called them “relatively minor inconsistencies.” Kling wants the appellate court to reconsider. And he maintains that the heart of the sentencing evidence—the testimony of Jeffrey Scott—may be the most problematic of all.
Of course, the feds and Scott himself have given a different account. They say he ultimately decided he wanted to come clean and tell the truth, even though there was a price on his head.
