It's too late. That's what Madison County State's Attorney Tom Haine is saying, after the man who pleaded guilty to the murder of an Edwardsville Attorney now wants to change his plea. "I'm confident that he will not be able to withdraw his guilty plea."
Haine says when Timothy Banowitz entered his guilty plea for the 2020 murder of attorney Randy Gori, the judge clearly read him the instructions. "When you plead guilty, the judge is very careful about making sure you're doing so freely, with total knowledge of what it means to you, that no one's coercing you, it's all done in open court. And that all occurred in this case."
The 32-year old Banowitz is serving a 70 year sentence for the killing. Banowitz now claims he was coerced into making the plea bargain and that his request to change his mind got lost in the prison mail, causing him to miss the deadline. A status hearing in the case is set for April 13.
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