Record-setting year in DuPage for murder convictions
Dmitry Smirnov needed little time to decide he was willing to spend the rest of his life behind bars.
Less than four months after he ambushed his ex-girlfriend in an Oak Brook parking lot, shooting her 12 times, the 21-year-old Canadian man agreed to a maximum sentence for the April slaying.
Smirnov's case turned heads in DuPage County because it's uncommon for murder suspects to plead guilty so quickly without trying to negotiate a reduced sentence. Then again, it was far from an average year in Illinois' second-most populous county, which convicted a record 19 killers this year — about double the amount typical in recent years.
Coincidentally, that unprecedented rate came on the heels of abolition of the death penalty in Illinois and predictions that murder convictions would be harder to come by as prosecutors lost that bit of plea-negotiating leverage. Meanwhile, other suburban counties reported average numbers of murder convictions this year.
In DuPage, it seems 2011 was just an anomaly that included a conviction in a 35-year-old murder. And, two homicide suspects didn't even attempt to mount defenses.
“I don't think anyone really expected this many in one year,” State's Attorney Robert Berlin said. “We had a number of cases that had been pending awhile, and it just so happened all of them got set for trial. Then you had some unusual circumstances. More than anything, it was timing.”
Smirnov, who has no chance of being paroled, was one of 10 defendants to plead guilty to murder charges in DuPage this year. Nine others were convicted at trial, while three either pleaded guilty to lesser charges or were acquitted.
It was the first time since 1998 that the county obtained more than 10 convictions for first- or second-degree murder, according to records from the state's attorney's office. There were seven such convictions in 2008 and nine in 2009, authorities said.
The numbers reflect a documented and steady increase in killings in one of Illinois' wealthiest counties in the past 20 years, which some attribute to an increase in population. A majority of the recent cases also were domestic in nature, not random.
“This might be a record, but I have a feeling that record will be broken in years to come because it seems we're getting more serious cases in general,” Public Defender Jeff York said. “There was a time when murder was a rare thing here.”
On average, Berlin said, local prosecutors charge seven or eight murders a year and most of them take at least a year to resolve. This year's high conviction rate doesn't necessarily mark a spike in crime, he said, but reflects a combination of unusual circumstances and a tough stance on violent crime.
“I think what you take from 19 murder convictions is a feeling of satisfaction knowing that the state's attorney's office makes these types of cases a priority, and we're getting the job done,” Berlin said. “A lot of these were difficult, complicated cases.”
One high point of the year for prosecutors was charging imprisoned killer Michael Whitney with the 1976 murder of Darlene Stack, a nursing student who was raped and repeatedly stabbed in a Wheaton boardinghouse. Whitney took even less time than Smirnov — about a month — before pleading guilty in the cold case and agreeing to a life sentence.
Berlin has argued that the decision in March to abolish the death penalty would remove a powerful bargaining chip for prosecutors. But he still expects to see fewer guilty pleas to murder as a result of the change.
Berlin noted that Whitney was already decades into a 60-year prison term for an unrelated killing when he pleaded guilty, and that Smirnov had researched the death penalty and later asked investigators if it was true he'd only face life in prison.
“It's very unusual for a defendant to plead guilty to natural life when that's the maximum. It happened twice, but those were very unusual cases,” Berlin said. “The Smirnov case — really over any other case — proved the death penalty is indeed a deterrent. There is a very good chance that that victim might still be alive if we had a death penalty.
“Smirnov was more than willing to take that sentence because, I think in his mind, he had accomplished what he wanted to do. You can't use that as a barometer for what will happen in the future.”
Waukegan attorney Jed Stone, whose client John Gilbert pleaded guilty but mentally ill to a February 2009 killing in Burr Ridge, said he also doubted the death penalty change had anything to do with the conviction rate in DuPage.
“I don't believe the death penalty ever acted as a deterrent for murder. So it doesn't create an atmosphere where trials are more likely to be won by prosecutors or pleas more likely to be obtained by prosecutors,” said Stone, who has represented more than 130 murder suspects in his 35-year career.
“The death penalty ... is really a poisonous tree that I'm glad we're no longer growing in the state of Illinois,” he added. “All of the attempts to reform the death penalty were like being a Bonsai gardener — you clip and you clip but it's still a poisonous tree.”
In McHenry County, murder filings stayed status quo, with three cases charged this year and two convictions. One defendant was found not guilty by reason of insanity, and another was convicted of involuntary manslaughter. Comparable year-end totals for Lake and Cook counties weren't readily available.
“We really haven't noticed any changes in the violent crime we're seeing,” McHenry County Assistant State's Attorney and Criminal Division Chief Philip Hiscock said. “It's been fairly steady the last few years. We have about one to three murders a year and that's been fairly consistent.”
In Kane County, murder convictions were up this year, but no records were set. Prosecutors obtained 11 first- and second-degree murder convictions compared to three the year before. The county's hallmark year was 2008, when convictions were entered in 16 murder cases, including five cold cases that were charged as a result of investigations into years' worth of gang killings in Aurora.
“There's so many variables that go into getting a major case like a murder case to trial. Part of it is timing, part of it is availability of staff, the judge's calendar, things like that,” State's Attorney Joe McMahon said. “Overall, both our felony and misdemeanor filings are down for the second year in a row. I hope that's a trend.”