Thug who raped and killed 3-year-old Riley Fox is caught. Police had her father in jail for 8 months

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.suntimes.com/news/24-7/2324742,riley-fox-murder-charges-052710.article

Incarcerated sex offender charged in Riley Fox murder

WILL COUNTY | 'Justice for Riley'
Comments

May 27, 2010

By FRANK MAIN and DAN ROZEK Staff Reporters

A man already behind bars for sexually assaulting a relative has allegedly confessed to kidnapping, sexually assaulting and killing 3-year-old Riley Fox — but he told investigators he initially intended only to burglarize her family’s home in Will County, sources said Thursday.

Scott Eby, 38, was charged with first-degree murder and predatory criminal sexual assault of a child, bringing to a conclusion one of the area’s highest-profile unsolved killings, authorities said.

“Finally there can be justice for Riley,” her parents said in a statement.

In June 2004, Riley was drowned in a creek near far southwest suburban Wilmington and found naked hours later after a massive search. Her father, Kevin Fox, spent eight months in jail on charges of killing Riley after he gave a video confession that he later said was coerced by investigators.

DNA evidence from Riley’s sexual assault and from duct tape covering her mouth didn’t match Kevin Fox’s, and he was freed in 2005. He and his wife, Melissa, were awarded $8 million in a wrongful-arrest lawsuit filed in federal court against Will County officials. A federal appeals court said the evidence against Kevin Fox was weak and ripped Will County investigators for hastily narrowing their probe to him.

------------------------------------

This happened not too far from me. After reading the reports in the paper after this happened I was completely convinced that father was guilty. Police even got him to admit to the crime of raping and killing his own daughter. But DNA proved he was innocent.

Even after he was cleared and released some of the prosecutors and cops involved with the case were still insisting the father was guilty.

This is horrific. And while they had the wrong person in jail the actual killer was still free not too far from where I live. My grand kids are here at my house all the time. And this child killer was running around this area while the cops had the wrong person in jail.

:scared:

Don

[Tommy_Carcetti]

1. I saw this on Nightline yesterday.

To be honest, I was more enraged at the police who cooerced the false confession from the father than the actually killer himself. Someone needs to go to jail for that.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

2. 12 words into the body of the story: "allegedly."

Hang the thug.

:think:

[NNN0LHI]

4. No lets not

People were calling for hanging the innocent father around here back then too.

Don

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

5. You began the thread with "Thug."

:shrug:

[NNN0LHI]

11. One word into the body of the story: A man already behind bars for sexually assaulting a relative

What did you want me to call him? Sweetheart?

Thug fits.

Don

[unblock]

13. "allegedly confessed". is he charged with aggravated confession?

"allegedly" is normally used in conjunction with an actual crime, regarding a determination only a jury can make, or at least something that can't be objectively verified easily.

whether or not he confessed should be pretty easy for a reporter to verify.

[FedUpWithIt All]

18. The do have a DNA match. But i agree, courts first. n/t

[EFerrari]

3. I remember that case. Really scary, Don. n/t

[Brickbat]

6. If investigators in Suburbia, IL, can make a man falsely confess to killing and raping his own

3-year-old, why do we think torture is useful?

This is a devastating case all around. I hope Riley gets justice.

[TexasObserver]

7. This is a good example of how innocent men get convicted.

The father would have been convicted without exonerating DNA evidence.

I hope those who don't believe police coerce confessions will take a long look at this case.

[madokie]

8. That whole deal pisses me off too

[kestrel91316]

9. DP

[proteus_lives]

17. +1

[Eric J in MN]

10. How did they get the father to confess? NT

NT

[NNN0LHI]

12. Besides the stuff below they made him pay for the DNA test that proved his innocence

http://www.refugeesunleashed.net/post-905744.html

Following 14 1/2 hours of questioning, Fox on Oct. 27, 2004, gave investigators a 20-minute videotaped statement in which he said he accidentally killed Riley. Fox contends he was coerced into making the statement after being promised he wouldn’t face first-degree murder charges…

Rozek goes on to explain that Tomczak allegedly fooled Kevin Fox into saying that Riley’s death was an accident, Fox apparently thinking that the worst in store for him then might be an involuntary manslaughter charge. Instead, Fox was charged with first-degree murder and Tomczak later publicly stated he would be seeking the death penalty. Fortunately for Kevin Fox, Republican Tomczak lost his bid for re-election to Democrat James Glasgow. Glasgow ordered DNA testing after he took office, and it was this testing that cleared Fox of suspicion. Tomczak, you see, while still in office prior to Glasgow’s swearing-in, allegedly ordered investigators to halt any testing of Fox’s DNA.

Now Fox is suing, as anyone would. During his interrogation he was threatened with prison rape, detectives telling him he’d end up a punk if he didn’t cooperate. Fox’s son Tyler, age 6, was allegedly so traumatized by a “forensic interview” around the same time that he pulled his sweatshirt hood over his head and cried for his Mom and Dad. Further details like these can be found in this Chicago Tribune article about Tomczak’s being added to the suit; Tomczak added to federal lawsuit.

I couldn’t help but feel that if all this happened to Kevin Fox, then a lawsuit isn’t enough. If Jeff Tomczak truly coerced Fox into confessing, for the reasons alleged in the suit, then there should be disbarment and jail time in his future. Because if Kevin Fox was really railroaded as part of an effort to maintain a politician’s hold on power, that politician and the police did more than emotionally brutalize the Fox family. If the lawsuit is founded, and Kevin Fox was simply, in his mind, trying to get out of the situation alive, even while struggling with his own grief over Riley’s death, then not only did Tomczak and cops working Kevin Fox for that fake confession nearly destroy the life of an already egregiously wounded family, they permitted the real killer to sit back comfortably and watch the news secure in the knowledge for 7 months, at least, that no one was looking for him any more.

[FedUpWithIt All]

19. According to his attorney they also made him review images of his baby after death. n/t

[tango-tee]

21. I typed my first response to your OP

without looking further into the thread. Utter disgust is too weak a word to use to convey what I feel.

OMG. Of course the family should sue, but I doubt that any amount of financial settlement can ever bring peace into that man's heart (or his family's) again. I can well imagine his soul has been shattered into a thousand pieces.

How can that family ever heal? The rape and murder of their little girl, the father being accused of being the perpetrator, coerced into confessing. Words fail me.

There are several people who need to burn in the deepest pits of hell for this. The killer, for one. And the investigators who coerced the so-called confession.

There are times I want to despair.

[DFW]

31. Tomczak should do at least the time Fox did

And the bill for the settlement should be charged to him as well.

Railroading an innocent into jail for personal political gain should be a felony with a minimum of 20 years to life.

[old mark]

14. This happens pretty often - Prosecutors and law enforcement get an idea that

a person is guilty and NOTHING changes their mind, not even confessions by others or lack of evidence. Many are convicted and spend years in prison, their lives destroyed, because authorities won't admit they were wrong.
The book, "The Innocent Man", by John Grisham is an example of this...link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Innocent_Man:

A sad and scarey fact - sometimes the real killers are still out here.

mark

[pipoman]

29. Then they threaten to charge the innocent person

with a crime which has a mandatory 100 years in prison, 'but if you give a confession we will charge you with this other crime which allows for 2 years with good behavior'..after 15 or 20 hours of straight browbeating it is amazing what a person can be convinced to do or say...

[Th1onein]

15. And they say that the cops are the good guys. Yeah, right.

Did you know that, in Louisiana, there have been more death row inmates exonerated recently than have been put to death? What does that tell you about these "confessions"? And about the men and women who bring these suspects to "justice"? The system is broken. It is feeding off of the poor.

[Hydra]

16. +1

*laughs* Yet another thing I've been right about that makes people uncomfortable.

If our justice system isn't looking to lock up real perps, what is it doing?

[notadmblnd]

34. They're criminalizing as many people as they possibly can

And if you don't have the resources to fight back, it's very likely you'll become a convicted criminal. I've had my own personal experience with this and I believe that; if we hadn't had the money to fight the bastards, my husband would have died in prison. It's not about justice with these people, it's about convictions.

[Hydra]

37. I had a similar experience as a kid in a custody battle

I thought that sort of thing was isolated. Silly me.

[tango-tee]

20. What on earth did the investigators do to the father

to get him to confess to something so horrific?

[Heidi]

22. Why do innocent people confess?

From The Innocence Project: http://www.innocenceproject.org/understand/False-Confessions.php

[tango-tee]

23. Thanks, Heidi.

That only goes to show we're all vulnerable. Just one's bad luck, perhaps. Wrong time, wrong place. Guilty until proven innocent.

[Heidi]

24. Exactly.

The Innocence Project does a lot of good in the world, and educating us about how very vulnerable we are to coercion, duress and unscrupulous authorities is a whole bunch of that good. :hi:

[NikRik]

28. Looking in from the outside...

its easy to say I would never under any circumstances confess to such a terrible crime against any child and my own daughter to top it off. However perhaps after days of being locked up in a room constantly being bagered by police, we all have our cracking point ! I just wonder how long I would be able to hold on to reality and tell them to F off and go find the murderer of my daughter. I would hope that I would never no matter what let them break me and confess to something I did not do. A horror so terrible as raping and murdering your three year old daughter I just cant imagine I would ever confess to this !
Sad Sad Story ,NikRik

[DevonRex]

36. First, the father was already traumatized by his daughter's rape and murder.

Under those circumstances it's fairly easy for an interrogator to find the cracks in the psyche and use them to make the prisoner say whatever he wants him to say.

[Snarkoleptic]

25. Law Professor explains why you should not talk to cops...

Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8z7NC5sgik
Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08fZQWjDVKE

[aikoaiko]

27. Important for all to see.

[pipoman]

30. Marked for later

we taught our kids to talk to police only as a witness to a crime, never as a suspect...'let them arrest you and put you in a cell, don't talk to anyone at all under any circumstances' was our ongoing mantra...too many years as defense investigators, my wife and I...

[DailyGrind51]

26. Illinois prosecutors have a reputation for wrongful prosecution.

Yet, always manage to get re-elected!

[bedazzled]

32. absolutely tragic! sounds like the john christie case, england after WWII

the father in that case, timothy evans was hanged.
he was lucky, though. they gave him a pardon
posthumously.

:sarcasm:

sure that made all the difference.

[pipoman]

33. Oh,

Even after he was cleared and released some of the prosecutors and cops involved with the case were still insisting the father was guilty.

This happens all the time too..many in the law enforcement and prosecution business would rather a guilty person walk than to reopen a case and admit they were wrong the first time. In this case and others like it, those prosecutors and police should be immediately fired for dereliction of duty...immediately..and be subject to civil actions by the victim or the victim's family..the message? Do Your Fucking Job And Leave Your Ego At Home, People Trust You.

[DevonRex]

35. Horrific things can happen when people are grilled for hours on end.

Anybody on DU would eventually admit to crucifying Jesus Christ personally if that is what a group of bad detectives wants you to say.