Homan trial removed from July jury docket after prosecution learns potential witness is unavailable

QUINCY — The trial of the former owner of the Barn nightclub, who faces one count of aggravated battery in connection to a March 2020 incident involving a former Quincy University student, has been removed from the July jury docket.

Steven Homan, 48, of Quincy appeared before Judge Kevin Tippey on Friday morning in Adams County Circuit Court. A pretrial hearing was scheduled, and the trial was set to begin July 11. Michael Mettes, Homan’s counsel, had filed a motion to ask for a continuance in the case. 

Josh Jones, assistant state’s attorney for Adams County, said he would not object to the continuance. He said he recently learned Det. Erik Cowick with the Quincy Police Department could not testify at a July trial.

“Det. Cowick said he told me a week ago when I was doing a search warrant with him at 2 o’clock in the morning (that he wouldn’t be available),” Jones said. “I don’t remember that conversation. He says he told me. I don’t disbelieve him. I just don’t remember it.”

Jones said he didn’t inform Mettes about Cowick’s unavailability until Thursday when Cowick called to remind him.

“We certainly weren’t going to be calling (Cowick as a prosecution witness), but I understand that (Mattis might) want to because he did interviews with two of the main witnesses of our case,” Jones said. “I do apologize for not making them aware of that beforehand.”

A status hearing was set for 10:30 a.m. July 26.

Mettes, an associate with the St. Louis firm of Rosenblum, Schwartz & Fry, appeared on behalf of Scott Rosenblum, who has represented rapper Nelly and former St. Louis Rams football stars Marshall Faulk and Leonard Little. 

Homan was charged April 14, 2021, after a Quincy Police Department investigation of an April 4 incident at the Barn, 711 S. Front. Jazzpher Evans, a former Quincy University student from Shorewood, Ill., 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 that Homan placed his arm around Evans’ neck and “drug her for 20 seconds.”

Homan turned himself into police on April 15. His bail was set at $25,000. He was released after posting $2,500. 

Evans has since left Quincy University and is on the women’s basketball team at the University of Alaska-Anchorage.