November 23, 2024
Local News

Witness: Smith wasn't involved in 2001 murder

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WOODSTOCK – Jurors saw two videotaped interviews Wednesday of a woman who said Kenny Smith had nothing to do with the Burrito Express murder – because her boyfriend and cousin actually did it.

Smith, 36, is charged with first-degree murder in the death of Raul Briseño, who owned Burrito Express on Route 120 in McHenry.

Briseño was shot after chasing two men out of the restaurant with a knife during a botched armed robbery on March 6, 2001.

Smith was convicted twice, but both convictions and subsequent 67-year prison sentences were overturned on appeal.

Defense attorneys have said that Smith had nothing to do with the shooting and instead point their fingers at a McHenry woman, Susanne Dallas DeCicco.

DeCicco is in custody at the McHenry County Jail on retail theft and drug charges.

In 2005, DeCicco was accused of shoplifting from a Kohl’s in Quincy. While there, she told police that her boyfriend, Russell “Rusty” Levand, and cousin, Adam Hiland, were responsible for the shooting.

In January 2006, DeCicco was interviewed by Illinois State Police while she was in prison, and again recounted what happened the night Briseño died.

“I know who did it, and it’s not the people who are incarcerated for it,” she told them.

According to DeCicco’s accounts, Levand and Hiland stole a gun from her dad’s room in a house about a block and a half from Burrito Express.

DeCicco said she saw them with the gun in the trunk of her car and yelled at them to put it back. She went back into the house, and they were gone when she returned.

Knowing they couldn’t have gone far on foot, DeCicco said she went to look for Levand and Hiland and found them running alongside Burrito Express. They were wearing masks, and Levand had a gun.

She left and went back to the house, only to see Levand and Hiland running back. They got into her car.

Hiland’s face was covered in blood, DeCicco said, but he said it wasn’t his. They yelled at her to “just go,” and she drove away.

“I was scared,” she said. “They had just killed somebody.”

DeCicco said that she hadn’t planned any of the attempted robbery and hadn’t driven them there, but Levand and Hiland later told her what happened.

Levand allegedly said that he and Hiland went into the restaurant to get money and a guy threw a knife at them. Two men then chased them out, eventually catching up with Hiland, which was when Levand started shooting.

She said Levand eventually used the gun to hit the man who caught Hiland, and later had to pull hair out of it.

However, DeCicco got the date of the incident wrong during the first incident, saying it happened March 5.

DeCicco said she told her mother, sister and a friend what happened, thinking that if someone else went to the police, Levand and Hiland wouldn’t know it was she who told.

“I told plenty of people for somebody to do something,” she said.

However, jurors have not heard that a year later, DeCicco testified during a hearing that she made up the story to upset her boyfriend.

Three of Smith’s alleged accomplices have been convicted.

David Collett pleaded guilty to attempted aggravated robbery and was sentenced to five years in prison. Jennifer McMullan, the getaway driver, was sentenced to 27 years after a trial.

Also, despite having previously accepted a 20-year plea deal, Justin Houghtaling testified last week that he wasn’t involved at all.