Trial date for Quincy nightclub owner tentatively set for Jan. 10

QUINCY — A date has been tentatively set for the trial of a Quincy nightclub owner charged with one count of aggravated battery in the reported assault of a female student at Quincy University.

Judge Amy Lannerd set the date for the trial of Steven W. Homan, 47, for Jan. 10, 2022. during a status hearing Tuesday in Adams County Circuit Court. Homan was scheduled to appear for a status hearing on Aug. 24, but it was continued to Tuesday. 

Homan’s attorney, Michael Mettes, told Lannerd he had been given a thumb drive and a CD on Tuesday and asked if the trial date could be set for later this year because of a backlog of cases in his office. Josh Jones, assistant state’s attorney for Adams County, learned toward Mettes and told him it would be OK to set a trial date in January if that helped clear his schedule.

“Realistically, it will give us the opportunity to get through discovery and be in a position where we could realistically be ready at that point in time,” Mettes said.

Lannerd explained she didn’t have the January assignments for judges, but she offered 9 a.m. Jan. 10 for the trial. Homan will return to court for a status hearing at 8:45 a.m. Nov. 2 to “make sure everyone is very clear” on the date and who the judge will be, Lannerd said. 

A charge of aggravated battery is a Class 3 felony. It carries a possible range of two to five years in the Illinois Department of Corrections, plus one year of supervised release.

Homan, 47, pled not guilty May 12. He was charged April 14 after a Quincy Police Department investigation of an incident at The Barn nightclub, 711 S. Front, on April 4. Jazzpher Evans, a Quincy University student from Joliet, alleges she was attacked by Homan. A charging document filed in Adams County Circuit Court alleges Homan “knowingly made physical contact of an insulting or provoking nature” with Evans, and Homan placed his arm around Evans’ neck and “drug her for 20 seconds.”

Evans, who was 19 at the time of the incident, was a member of the women’s basketball team at QU. She since has left the school.

Homan was indicted by an Adams County grand jury on April 29. Homan relinquished the liquor license for The Barn on April 26. He is free on bond after posting $2,500.

Mettes appeared on behalf of Scott Rosenblum, who has represented rapper Nelly and former St. Louis Rams football stars Marshall Faulk and Leonard Little.