Highland Park shooter Robert Crimo III gets life in prison

Robert Crimo III, the admitted shooter in the Highland Park July 4 parade massacre, was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole on Thursday, as a courtroom packed with survivors of the mass shooting looked on.

Judge Victoria Rossetti ruled Crimo would serve seven life sentences, one after another — one for each of the people murdered in the 2022 attack that has led to reforms in state gun laws and how parents are charged for violence committed by their children.

Calling him "irretrievable depraved, permanently incorrigible ... and beyond any rehabilitation," Rossetti gave Crimo the strongest sentence she could.

She noted Crimo has shown no remorse, and had planned the attack over several years.

What's still a mystery, she said, is why he did it.

"To right some wrong, or just because?" Rossetti said. "But his actions tell this court that he was just a coward, hiding behind a skirt, makeup and an assault weapon that he used to terrorize a community."

But before Rossetti finished the hearing, she paused court and left the room.

Crimo had requested to come up during the hearing, which he on Thursday had declined through his lawyers to attend, even as it extended into its second day. Lake County State's Attorney Eric Rinehart could be heard telling survivors in the gallery that it was an unprecedented situation.

Minutes later, court resumed with one of Crimo's attorney saying he decided not to come after all. Crimo had sought to raise an issue about access to religious books — not about the sentencing, the attorney said.

It followed a briefly tense moment in the courtroom, as dozens of survivors expected to come face-to-face with Crimo. Crimo had declined to attend the first day of sentencing on Wednesday, when more than a dozen survivors spoke about their trauma.

Rinehart argued for the maximum sentence allowable. Rossetti agreed, and ruled that the seven life sentences would then be followed by four dozen 50-year sentences, all served simultaneously, for each of the 48 attempted murder counts — one for each of the people injured in the attack.

Rinehart said he struggled in court to describe the pain and trauma of the victims and community.

"I used the word 'oceans of pain, trauma, grief and loss,' and I don't even think that word is really adequate to describe the impact that this case has had," he said.

Rinehart said Crimo avoided coming to his own sentencing hearing because he was afraid.

"It is clear that he was unable to confront what he had done," Rinehart said.

Crimo’s attorneys did not present any mitigating factors, adding that Crimo understood that he would die in prison.

Highland Park Mayor Nancy Rotering told reporters the sentencing "strengthens our resolve to push for meaningful change" for gun control efforts.

"It is yet another opportunity for a call to action as we continue to plead with our nation's leaders to take decisive action to prevent future tragedies," Rotering said. "No community should ever have to endure this kind of devastation."

In court, Rossetti acknowledged that "so many more [people] in the community" were victims of this attack beyond the 55 people shot.

‘Closing a chapter’

Survivors of the attack said they were relieved the court process was over and felt ready to move beyond it.

"It's closing a chapter on this part of our lives. And I don't have to think about him anymore," Liz Turnipseed, who was shot in the pelvis during the attack, told reporters. She said the threat of Crimo coming to court last minute was stressful, but tracked with how he acted throughout the court process.

"The way that he's tried to exert control throughout this entire process has been to try to throw these wrenches," she said.

Ashbey Beasley, who attended the parade but was not injured, said she hopes the sentence helps bring people "real closure." Beasley has advocated for restrict access to assault weapons, like the one Crimo used, in Springfield and Washington D.C. She said she is working to craft a bill that would allow prosecutors to charge some mass shooters with terrorism.

In his police interview shown in court Wednesday, Crimo said he planned the attack for years, starting in 2017 or 2018, and even wanted to carry it out on July 4, 2020, but the parade was canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Authorities said he disguised himself when he allegedly fired more than 80 rounds from an assault rifle overlooking Central Avenue and Second Street at 10:14 a.m. that morning.

Killed in the massacre were Irina and Kevin McCarthy, Jacki Sundheim, Katherine Goldstein, Eduardo Uvaldo, Nicolas Toledo and Stephen Straus.

Crimo initially fled in his mother's car. He headed toward Madison, Wisconsin, where authorities said he considered a second attack before turning back. He was arrested near Lake Forest later that day.

Crimo was indicted on 117 felony counts in his August 2022 arraignment. Twenty-one of the counts were for the murders of seven victims — three counts for each of them.

As the case slowly made its way through the Lake County court system, Crimo briefly dropped his attorneys to represent himself, moving up the trial date to early 2024. Crimo changed his mind weeks later, bringing his attorneys back on the case and pushing the trial date to February 2025.

Jury selection began in late February and attorneys chose 12 jurors and six alternates for the trial. On the day the trial was set to begin, Crimo suddenly pleaded guilty to all the charges against him: 21 counts of murder — one for each of the seven people killed — and 48 counts of attempted murder.

The shooting’s impact

The massacre led to a statewide assault weapons ban that survived challenges at the Illinois and U.S. Supreme Courts.

Advocates invoked the shooting in renewed calls for a national assault weapons ban. Highland Park Mayor Nancy Rotering, who helped implement an assault weapons ban in the north suburb in 2013, traveled to Washington, D.C., after the attack with other officials to push for a national ban.

The shooting also highlighted the shortcomings of the state's red flag laws meant to prohibit the sale of firearms to certain people. Crimo was able to buy the assault weapons used in the attack despite two police reports that indicated he made suicidal statements and threatened to harm his family. That didn’t trigger the state’s red flag law because the family denied the threats and there was no domestic violence order or court order restraining him from having a gun.

After the shooting, Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Illinois State Police Director Brendan Kelly implemented an emergency rule that allowed the state police to consider a wider range of information to flag someone as a "clear and present danger."

In a post on X, Pritzker said there were "no words" to describe the shooting, but Crimo's sentencing would "allow survivors and the loved ones of those impacted to continue to heal."

The shooting also led to a groundbreaking prosecution of Crimo's father for helping his son obtain the weapons used in the attack. His father, Robert Crimo Jr., signed his son's gun ownership application in 2019 because his son was too young to get one himself. Lake County prosecutors later charged Crimo Jr. with reckless conduct because they alleged he was aware of his son's past suicidal and homicidal statements.

Crimo Jr. was about to stand trial late last year when he accepted a last-minute deal, pleading guilty to misdemeanor counts and accepting a two-month sentence. Rinehart said then that the guilty plea would serve as a “beacon” for prosecutors across the country to hold parents accountable for the actions of their children.