Man freed on murder charge accused of aggravated battery in Sycamore

SYCAMORE – Visibly conflicted, a DeKalb County judge ruled Tuesday that a man who was wrongfully convicted for a 2000 murder, and who is charged with choking a woman in Sycamore, should stay in jail.

Bernard B. Mims, 38, was released Oct. 27, 2016, when Cook County prosecutors dismissed his conviction for an October 2000 murder after he’d served 12 years in prison, First Assistant State’s Attorney Stephanie Klein said during Mims’ bond hearing Tuesday afternoon.

Mims was convicted of killing an off-duty Cook County correctional officer, according to news reports. His lawyer at the time said he was "bedridden" at the time of the killing, after he himself was shot about 10 days earlier, according to the report. Officials said his medical condition at the time of the crime was a factor in the decision to vacate his conviction.

He was brought back Tuesday to DeKalb County from Duluth, Minnesota, where he said in court he has been living in a shelter. He said the address he provided the court, in the 17000 block of Novak Drive in Hazel Crest, is his father’s public housing apartment, where he recently found out he’d no longer be allowed to live.

“I’m trying to get my own place and get my stuff together because I was incarcerated for something I didn’t do, and now I’m being prosecuted for something I didn’t do, and it’s going to come back to trial,” Mims said. “I didn’t do anything to this woman. I wasn’t even there. She’s just obsessed.”

A warrant was issued for his arrest May 1, after the woman reported he’d choked her twice and slapped her repeatedly until her nose bled and her hearing was damaged. The incident happened April 28 at her home in the 2100 block of Highland Drive in Sycamore, court records show.

Mims is charged with aggravated domestic battery and, if convicted, could face three to seven years in prison. Mims also is charged with two counts of domestic battery, which are elevated to felonies punishable by one to three years in prison because of his criminal record, court records show.

Records show that before Mims’ 2014 wrongful conviction on the murder charge, he had been convicted in Cook County of domestic battery in 1997 and aggravated battery of a peace officer in 2002. Klein said he also had a previous gun possession charge in Cook County.

“While his criminal history is somewhat old, I think that can be accounted for by the fact that for the past 12 years, he hasn’t had the opportunity to commit offenses,” she said. “The state is concerned with the types of offenses he had.”

Judge Philip Montgomery granted the state’s request that bond be set at $30,000. If Mims posts $3,000 to be released, he can have no contact with the victim and must surrender any firearms.

Montgomery didn’t include electronic home monitoring as a condition because Mims said he’d be going back to Minnesota.

“I’m worried we’re never going to see him again,” Montgomery said. “If he was living in Hazel Crest, to be quite honest, let him out, put him on GPS and go from there.”

Mims will be back in court at 1:30 p.m. Friday for a petition to reduce bond being filed by his attorney, Tom McCulloch, the public defender.