INDIAN HILL, Ohio -- Embattled Cincinnati attorney Stan Chesley and his wife, Judge Susan Dlott, were robbed at gunpoint in their Indian Hill home Friday at around 10:40 p.m., according to police.
The men broke in through a locked back door and took IDs, credit cards, fur coats, jewelry and other items from the couple at gunpoint, Indian Hill police said. The men were armed with handguns and a stun gun, police said.
Police reports said the three suspects "kicked in the basement door of the victims' residence, committed theft and pointed guns at (Chesley and Dlott)'s heads."
The suspects -- Terry Jackson, 21, Darrell Kinney, 20, and Demetrius Williams, 20 -- were apprehended by Madeira police following a traffic stop the same evening.
Police made the stop because the men rolled through a stop sign. Kinney kicked out a window in the police cruiser and tried to run away before an officer tackled him, police said.
Police also spotted a fur coat sticking out of the trunk, they said. A search turned up the stolen items, weapons and three rifles in the trunk, two of which were loaded according to police.
All three suspects were charged with aggravated robbery and two counts of abduction each. They all used semi-automatic pistols during the robbery, court documents said. Kinney was also charged with vandalism and escape.
Police said they are "not looking for anyone else at this time."
Stolen property from Chesley and Dlott's home was found in the car, according to the affidavit.
Chesley and Dlott's six bedroom, seven bathroom home sits on five acres on Camargo Road in Indian Hill, records from the Hamilton County Auditor's Office shows.
Police said they believed the men targeted the home because it was large and not because of Chesley or Dlott.
Dlott was appointed to the federal bench by President Bill Clinton in 1995 and has overseen numerous notable cases in her career. Last year, she allowed a lawsuit by 10 tea party groups to move forward against the Internal Revenue Service, rejecting a request by the federal government to dismiss all the allegations that the agency subjected conservative groups to additional, often burdensome scrutiny.
Chesley gained national notoriety as an attorney for his large class action lawsuits that earned him nicknames like the “Master of Disaster” and the “Prince of Torts,” starting with a case representing the victims of the 1977 Beverly Hills Supper Club fire. He won his clients $49 million in verdicts and settlements in that case.
During his 53-year career in law, Chesley won billions for clients in cases against Pan Am over the Lockerbie bombing and Dow Corning over breast implants, among many others.
However, Chesley’s success began to turn within the past few years. The Kentucky Supreme Court disbarred Chesley because he was paid more than $7 million beyond what he was entitled to by contract for a 2001 suit against the maker of the diet drug combination Fen-Phen.
His clients have since sued him, and a Boone County judge issued a warrant for Chesley’s arrest in October when he failed to appear for a hearing. The Associated Press reported last month that Chesley wanted to resolve the case and admitted that he owed several million dollars, but not as much as his former clients were seeking.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
