Updates to our Terms of Use

We are updating our Terms of Use. Please carefully review the updated Terms before proceeding to our website.

Friday, March 29, 2024 | Back issues
Courthouse News Service Courthouse News Service

Woman Says WXLC Radio Promoted Date With Felon

WAUKEGAN, Ill. (CN) - In its "Win a Date With Travis Contest," WXLC Radio promoted violent felon Travis Harvey Jr. as "kind" and "a great guy," but he drugged and sodomized the woman who "won" the contest, she claims in Lake County Court.

Jane Doe says Harvey was convicted of the attack. She also complains that the court refused to let her sue Harvey and WXLC as Jane Doe.

Doe says NextMedia Operating, which owns WXLC in Waukegan, hosted a promo at a Waukegan restaurant and "featured defendant Harvey, a violent convicted felon, as the 'prize' bachelor. Jane Doe 'won' a date with Harvey, who then raped and sodomized her."

Doe says Harvey had been convicted of a violent felony before the event: "felony violation of a domestic violence order of protection."

She says before that conviction, Harvey had been convicted of a misdemeanor violation of a domestic violence order of protection. She says all this was in the public record.

Doe says she attended the promo, and "reasonably believed that if she were lucky enough to be the winner of the event, he would be a safe date." She says she "'won' the contest when Harvey selected her as the woman he wanted to take out on a date."

In February 2007, she says, they went on the date and Harvey "lured" her to his house, gave her a drugged drink, then "raped and sodomized her."

She says Harvey pleaded guilty on Nov. 17 to criminal sexual abuse.

In a pleading accompanying the lawsuit, she complains that the Lake County Court denied her request to sue under a fictitious name. "The Court denied plaintiff's motion, specifically stating that the parties' names were already of public record from the criminal proceeding - which was resolved two days earlier - and suggesting that plaintiff's name should not be afforded any more protection than convicted felon Harvey's."

Doe's attorney, Robert Baizer of Highland Park, adds: "Plaintiff is unaware of any case in Illinois or anywhere in the country where a rape victim has not been permitted to proceed under a fictitious name when requested." He cites eight rulings, adds, "There is no legitimate interest in publicizing the name of [a] rape victim," and asks the court to reconsider its ruling. She sued under the name Jane Doe.

She demands damages for willful and wanton conduct and negligence.

Categories / Uncategorized

Subscribe to Closing Arguments

Sign up for new weekly newsletter Closing Arguments to get the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and hot cases and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world.

Loading...