A South Side man with a long criminal record as a conman, thief and scammer was sentenced to 14 years in prison in connection to two very different felony cases.
In one case, Tirnell Williams, 45, pleaded guilty to identity theft between $10,000 and $100,000. In the second case, prosecutors accused him of masterminding a sex assault on an unwitting victim in a downtown hotel so that he could sue the hotel’s parent company.
Williams pleaded guilty in both cases on Dec. 12 in the Leighton Criminal Court Building. He entered the Stateville Correctional Center’s northern reception center this week to begin his sentence.
The sentencing perhaps closes a dark chapter of heinous crimes orchestrated by a career criminal who prosecutors portrayed as a ruthless opportunist willing to use innocent people to try to get a big payday.
In addition, while in custody, Williams regularly filed lawsuits against his jailers who he claimed violated the federal disabilities act. In 2022, while Williams remained in Cook County Jail awaiting trial, the Cook County Board approved a $10,000 settlement for a suit he brought against Sheriff Tom Dart and others.
In previous suits, the city of Chicago and Cook County approved settlements totaling $12,250.
Prosecutors have claimed in court that Williams’ girlfriend told them that he uses a wheelchair for the lawsuits he files and that he was able to walk.
Williams’ claims of being a paraplegic had not stalled his criminal career, including an ongoing felony case in Will County, where he was accused of being one of three men caught following a dramatic armed robbery at a Joliet cellphone store.
Williams’ extensive criminal history — which includes dozens of cases and several aliases — dates back to the 1990s when he was a teenager and includes several audacious crimes, including the theft of $100,000 in abstract artwork and running off with $3,000 in federal government money that was supposed to be used in a controlled drug buy.
Williams used ‘animal’ to commit hotel assault: prosecutors
In Williams’ most recent Cook County cases, he pleaded guilty to a single felony charge in exchange for prosecutors dropping others.
Williams was accused of setting up the Aug. 14, 2020, attack at the Home2 Suites by Hilton Chicago River North. During his September 2020 bail hearing, prosecutors claimed that he arranged the sexual assault of his fiancee’s girlfriend in the stairwell of the hotel so he could file a lawsuit accusing the hotel chain of lax security. Authorities said Williams was planning a second assault at another Hilton when he was arrested.
During that hearing, prosecutors said Williams was recorded saying he hadn’t known the attacker in the first assault but planned on using him for the second assault because he was “a real animal and he enjoys it.”
Two weeks after Williams’ hearing, authorities charged his live-in fiancee with felony communicating with a witness and harassing a witness after they say she ignored law enforcement and reached out to her victim friend, asking that she rescind the rape accusation. The woman later pleaded guilty to two counts of harassing a witness and was sentenced to three years in prison minus the 563 days she spent in jail.
In his own plea deal, Williams pleaded guilty to a single count of Class X armed robbery in exchange for prosecutors dropping the remaining 28 felony charges that included aggravated criminal sexual assault, criminal sexual assault and kidnapping among others. He received a 14-year prison sentence.
While in custody for the hotel case, he was indicted in a case where authorities said Williams used forged documents to assume the identity of a deceased elderly man to defraud the Navy Federal Credit Union of thousands of dollars.
In that case, he pleaded guilty to a single count of identity theft in exchange for dropping 10 other felony counts. He got a four-year sentence that will run concurrently with the longer sentence.
It remains unclear whether authorities ever identified the attacker. The state’s attorney’s office didn’t respond to a request for comment.
A Chicago police spokesperson on Wednesday said the case remained open, but provided no other details.
Williams’ attorney couldn’t be reached for comment.
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