Prosecutors said the victim was beaten after walking to Fort Sheridan Beach to check on loud noise near his home.
WAUKEGAN, Ill. — A Lake County jury has convicted Nicholas Caban, 23, and Jacob Firestone, 22, of second-degree murder in the 2022 killing of Matthew Ascaridis, a 45-year-old Highland Park father who was found dead on Fort Sheridan Beach after going out to investigate noises near his home.
The verdict, returned Saturday after a six-day trial, closes one stage of a case that has drawn attention across the North Shore since Ascaridis was found along the Lake Michigan shoreline in September 2022. Prosecutors said the evidence showed the two men beat him with extreme force and left him on the beach for hours before help was called. Defense accounts, relayed through investigators during the trial, said Ascaridis attacked first and was hurt in a fall, but prosecutors argued that version did not match the medical evidence or the blood and DNA evidence collected from the scene.
Jurors heard that the chain of events began late on Sept. 16, 2022, when Ascaridis and his wife, Darci Ascaridis, were packing for an upcoming family trip at their Highland Park home. Around 11 p.m., they began hearing loud noise coming from the nearby beach. Darci Ascaridis testified that her husband called police twice to report the disturbance and was told around 1 a.m. that it could take some time for an officer to respond. After that phone call, she said, he took a flashlight and headed down toward the beach next to their home. Prosecutors said he encountered Caban and Firestone there and a confrontation followed. A witness who had been with the two younger men on the beach told investigators they had been listening to music and riding a motorized surfboard in the water before he left. According to prosecutors, that left Ascaridis alone with Caban and Firestone during the encounter that turned deadly.
The body was found hours later. Prosecutors said the Lake County Major Crimes Task Force responded to Fort Sheridan Beach at about 5:12 a.m. on Sept. 17 and found Ascaridis dead with visible trauma. Another witness had reported seeing a man lying in the water just off shore. Roughly 10 minutes later, Highland Park police were sent to Caban’s home on Dato Avenue after a 911 call reporting an altercation. Officers found Firestone injured in the front yard and Caban nearby. Both were conscious, and both had injuries. Firestone was taken by ambulance to Highland Park Hospital and later transferred to Evanston Hospital, where he underwent brain surgery for a brain bleed. Caban was treated for cuts to his face and the back of his head. Investigators later testified that Caban said Ascaridis had fallen on the beach and that Firestone said Ascaridis attacked both men. Prosecutors told jurors those statements did not square with the physical evidence.
The medical testimony was central to the trial. Dr. Eimad Zakariya of the Lake County Coroner’s Office testified that Ascaridis suffered catastrophic spinal cord injuries of a kind more often seen in car crashes. Prosecutors said the autopsy showed repeated blows with significant force, a broken neck, numerous cuts to the back of the head and signs of drowning. Assistant State’s Attorney Ben Dillon argued that the evidence showed Ascaridis was struck multiple times while he was no longer moving. In a statement released after the verdict, Lake County State’s Attorney Eric Rinehart said prosecutors charged the case after investigators and the coroner’s pathologist uncovered what he called conclusive evidence that Ascaridis was killed by excessive violence. The prosecution also argued in closing that after the beating, the defendants did not call for immediate help and left Ascaridis on the beach, unable to move and struggling to breathe, before he died. The defense position, as described through testimony about the defendants’ statements, cast the incident as a fight in which Ascaridis was the aggressor, but the jury rejected that account.
The case has unfolded over more than three years. In the first hours after the death, authorities described the episode as a violent confrontation involving Ascaridis and two younger men. Investigators said they did not believe weapons were used. At that point, officials also said they were still trying to determine who started the fight. On Sept. 18, 2022, while the death investigation continued, authorities charged Caban with unlawful possession of a firearm after officers found a semiautomatic gun in his bedroom during a search. Officials said that weapon was not used in the beach confrontation. Two days later, Firestone was charged with obstructing justice after investigators said he tried to conceal evidence, including a cellphone and a wheelbarrow, tied to the incident. Those early charges kept the case in public view while detectives from the Lake County Forest Preserve Police and the Lake County Major Crimes Task Force continued reviewing witness accounts, forensic findings and scene evidence.
Murder charges were filed on March 16, 2023. The Lake County State’s Attorney’s Office announced then that both men were charged with one count of second-degree murder in Ascaridis’ death. Officials said the investigation showed Ascaridis had a violent confrontation with Firestone and Caban on a beach near his home. Both men were arrested after warrants were issued. At trial this month, prosecutors called more than a dozen witnesses, including police officers, medical personnel and expert witnesses, over six days of testimony that began April 13. The jury convicted both defendants on April 18. Under Illinois law, the second-degree murder convictions carry a sentencing range of four to 20 years in prison, with the term to be served at 50%, according to prosecutors. The defendants are scheduled to return to court June 18 for the next hearing, which is expected to address sentencing. Whether either side will seek post-trial motions before that date was not immediately clear.
The victim remained at the center of the courtroom record and of the public reaction after the verdict. Friends and relatives have described Ascaridis as a devoted husband and father of two whose death shattered a family and a well-known North Shore circle. Local coverage in the months after the killing identified him as a financial professional and longtime youth hockey coach in Winnetka. A fundraising page created soon after his death called him an incredible husband and a warm, steady presence for family and friends. Those details stood in sharp contrast to the trial’s account of his final hours: a man at home with his wife, packing for a trip, hearing noise outside, calling police for help and then walking down toward the lake with a flashlight. The setting also gave the case unusual resonance in Highland Park and nearby Lake Forest, where Fort Sheridan Beach and the lakeshore preserves are usually linked more with recreation than homicide investigations. By the end of the trial, the jury had accepted the prosecution’s account that the confrontation on that quiet stretch of beach ended not in mutual confusion but in a fatal beating.
For now, Caban and Firestone stand convicted, and the case moves toward sentencing. The next public milestone is their June 18 court appearance, when the judge is expected to take up the penalties they face and hear the next arguments about how the 2022 killing should be punished.
Author note: Last updated April 20, 2026.