By Nell Gluckman, From The Am Law Daily

Two years after prosecutors charged Sidley Austin real estate partner Stanley Stallworth with sexually assaulting an 18-year-old man, a judge in Chicago has found Stallworth not guilty.

Stanley Stallworth, 52, joined Sidley Austin in 1990 and worked in the firm’s Chicago office. He withdrew from the partnership after he was criminally charged in December 2013 and is now retired from the firm, according to Sidley Austin executive committee chairman Carter Phillips. The firm declined to comment on Stallworth’s case.

Stallworth and his 24-year-old nephew Therrie Miller were both charged with sexually assaulting the teenager in Stallworth’s Chicago home while the man was unconscious. The alleged victim told police that Miller invited him to the South Side residence, where he drank a small amount before blacking out. When he became conscious, he said, Miller was performing a sex act on him, and Stallworth allegedly did the same, according to news reports. The teen alleged that he awoke naked in the house the following morning and was treated at a hospital after telling his mother about the ordeal.

Stallworth’s lawyer confirmed that Cook County Judge Clayton Crane issued a not guilty verdict on Thursday following a bench trial. The verdict was first reported Thursday by the Chicago Tribune. Miller was also found not guilty.

His lead counsel, Donna Rotunno, who runs her own criminal defense boutique, said DNA test results did not implicate her client or Miller in any way. She added that police never visited the home where the crimes were alleged to have taken place. Miller was represented by Tony Thedford, who also runs a criminal defense boutique.

In a statement released through a spokesman, Stallworth condemned the Chicago Police Department and Cooks County prosecutors for bringing a case that he said lacked evidence and was not provable.

“I am grateful for the verdict,” said Stallworth in the statement. “I thank Judge Crane for his careful deliberation and decision. I have always been confident that a court would do the right thing…because I have always known that I was innocent of the charges. But today’s decision does not restore my life to what it was before these charges were brought. It does not restore what I had spent a lifetime building for myself. The last two years have been a nightmare for myself and my family, full of fear and outrage.”

Rotunno said her client had been waiting for the verdict before determining what his next steps would be. She said he will keep his home in Chicago, but will likely now spend most of his time in his native Alabama, where he has expressed interest in practicing law.

Stallworth also retained the Chicago criminal defense firm Henderson Adam, whose founder and name partner Victor Henderson formerly served as head of Holland & Knight’s Chicago office before leaving in 2011 to start his own boutique.

Henderson said Friday that the bench trial was “a huge ordeal and very stressful and life changing and life altering” for Stallworth.

“Clearly there were people who wanted to draw conclusions before the process had time to play itself out,” Henderson said. When asked if he was referring to Sidley Austin, Henderson declined to elaborate.

A veteran Chicago commercial real estate lawyer, Stallworth served as co-chair of Sidley Austin’s Committee on Racial and Ethnic Diversity, according to sibling publication The Recorder. In 2008 he was part of a team that advised Corn Products when it was purchased by Bunge for $4.4 billion.

IMAGE: Stanley Stallworth

For more on this story go to: http://www.americanlawyer.com/id=1202744706730/Sidley-Partner-Who-Left-Firm-Amid-Sex-Assault-Charges-Found-Not-Guilty#ixzz3uJvrwA8u