Kenosha DA faces sanctions request in homicide trial

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Defense attorneys are calling for sanctions against the Kenosha County district attorney over actions in an ongoing homicide trial.

The defendant, 42-year-old Justin Tercek, is charged with first-degree intentional homicide. He allegedly killed a new Kenosha homeowner on Feb. 3, 2025, apparently thinking the man was trespassing in the house of Tercek’s grandmother. The man who was killed had purchased the home following the grandmother’s death and had moved into the house just days before.

The trial before Judge Jodi Meier began Monday with jury selection. On Tuesday, Meier took the unusual step of sending the jury home for a day because of missteps taken by the prosecutor, Kenosha County District Attorney Xavier Solis.

According to online court minutes, Solis was late in providing the criminal histories of some of the witnesses, and in one case, couldn’t say for sure that one history was actually for the witness in question and not for someone else.

Defense attorneys said they needed more time to review the records, and they also complained that Solis gave them a stack of discovery while the trial was in progress. They’re requesting that Solis be sanctioned for his conduct.

The court minutes quoted Meier as saying the actions of the prosecutor are “extremely unacceptable.” Meier said she’ll take the request for sanctions under advisement.

The jury was ordered to return today.

This isn’t the first time Solis has run afoul of a judge. He was recently sanctioned for relying on artificial intelligence in the writing of a brief without double-checking its accuracy and disclosing that help came from AI.

According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Solis is also facing concerns about court backlogs amid staff turnover and prosecutor vacancies in the office, with about a third of the positions in the office vacant.