The village board in the south Chicago suburb of Dolton has approved a settlement for a lawsuit filed by a woman who accused village trustee Andrew Holmes of sexual assault.

A former Dolton village employee filed the civil lawsuit claiming Holmes sexually assaulted her while attending a conference for the village in Las Vegas in May 2023.

According to the lawsuit, Holmes, then-Dolton Mayor Tiffany Henyard, and more than a dozen others attended the conference. On May 26, after a group dinner, the village employee went out with Holmes. 

She said at some point, she felt disoriented, lightheaded, and felt as if the ground was moving, and then blacked out.

That same night, according to the lawsuit, Holmes called the mayor's security detail, who is also a Dolton police officer, to discuss his alleged sexual advances.

According to the lawsuit, that officer had reason to believe Holmes was drunk since the conversation was out of the ordinary. The officer then started to record Holmes before talking with him on Facetime.

On the Facetime video, he saw Homes shirtless and the alleged victim partially undressed. Holmes pointed the camera toward her, according to the lawsuit.

According to the lawsuit, the officer said he couldn't tell whether she consented. The next morning, she allegedly woke up fully dressed and unclear of what happened.

The lawsuit claims Holmes talked to the officer again after returning from Las Vegas, admitting he had sex with the village employee on the trip. The officer said in the lawsuit that he then advised her to seek medical attention.

The village employee requested a meeting with Henyard, the lawsuit said. Henyard met with the officer and the employee, even questioning the officer why Holmes would reveal information to the officer, according to the lawsuit.

During that meeting, Henyard advised the employee if the information got out, Henyard would be ruined, the lawsuit claims. She concluded the meeting by telling the alleged victim she'd take care of it. That meeting allegedly resulted in the village employee being terminated, along with the officer being demoted and removed from the mayor's security detail.

Holmes was not criminally charged. But he was fired from the nonprofit Chicago Survivors crime victim advocacy group after the accusation.

Holmes is also well known as a community activist who has helped solve murders and cold cases and has led criminal suspects to surrender. He was honored by the Chicago FBI for his anti-violence efforts in 2017.

Meanwhile, Henyard is not mayor of Dolton anymore. She was defeated in the February Democratic mayoral primary by village trustee Jason House, who went on to win the general election. House was sworn in as mayor in May.

However, Henyard is still the subject of an expanded federal investigation into the finances and spending in south suburban Dolton and how taxpayer money was spent in neighboring Thornton Township, where she was the supervisor.

She is also being sued by Jedidiah Brown, who accuses Henyard and several other people of attacking him during a brawl that erupted at a Thornton Township board meeting in late January.

A Dolton village spokesperson said the settlement of the former village employee's lawsuit was expected to be filed Wednesday morning. The village board voted Monday to approve the settlement.