Woman wins lawsuit in Will County against her abuser

A woman won a lawsuit in Will County against a man who was convicted of sexually abusing and battering her more than 9 years ago when she was 16 in Plainfield.

On Tuesday, the jury ruled in favor of Taylor Marcus, 25, and against William Snow, 60, in her lawsuit that accused him of sexually assaulting her in 2014 in Plainfield.

For Marcus, the verdict hopefully marks the end of an almost decade-long battle of what she said was her intention to hold Snow accountable for his crimes against her.

“I hope it’s the end of everything so I can move on with my life,” Marcus said.

The jury awarded Marcus $275,000 in damages. She said the case was not solely about the money but making Snow responsible for what happened.

“It’s more of a relief. I will say that there is a weight lifted,” Marcus said.

In 2018, a jury convicted Snow of aggravated criminal sexual abuse and battery of Marcus. Will County Chief Judge Dan Kennedy, who was not the chief judge at the time, sentenced Snow to three years of sex offender probation in 2019.

Marcus said she plans to donate the money she received from the lawsuit to the Epilepsy Foundation and Koolen De Vries Foundation in honor of her late son, Carson, who died in May at the age of four.

“I want to make sure I donate money for him in his name,” Marcus said.

Marcus said her son had Koolen-de Vries syndrome, a rare genetic disorder, and she believes a seizure played a role in his death and possibly some of the medication for the seizures, which were recalled.

She also plans to continue raising her other child, Lyla, who is six months’ old. She said she will continue to advocate for anyone who is a victim of sexual assault.

Marcus was represented by attorney John Schrock. Snow represented himself.

“I asked the jurors to hold Mr. Snow accountable for what he did, and the jury agreed to and they did,” Shrock said.

In a lengthy statement, Snow still insisted on Friday that he was “innocent of the charges that were brought against me in 2015.” He said Marcus was “inconsistent and contradictory” in her statements about the incident.

As a result of Snow’s 2018 conviction, he’s listed as child sex offender in the Illinois sex offender registry. In court filings, Snow listed his address in Boaz, Kentucky. He completed his probation on Jan. 25, 2022.

Marcus’ lawsuit case had been placed on hold for many years because of Snow’s criminal case and his attempts to appeal his conviction, according to Schrock.

“The criminal case was a complete re-victimization of Taylor,” Schrock said.

Marcus had to endure a second trial in Snow’s criminal case because he received ineffective legal representation from his attorney Paul Napolski in the first trial.

In 2016, Kennedy found Snow guilty of aggravated criminal sexual abuse and battery. Snow then dropped Napolski as his attorney and retained Omer Jaleel, who filed a motion for a new trial.

Kennedy granted the motion after determining that Napolski’s testimony about whether he informed Snow about his right to testify was “evasive, not credible and basically untruthful,” according to court transcripts.

After the jury convicted Snow in the second trial, he filed an appeal to 3rd District Appellate Court in Ottawa, which was denied in 2020. He then filed a petition with the U.S. Supreme Court in 2022, which also was denied.