Prosecutors: Stabbing suspect's 'rage boiling just beneath the surface'
Before he stabbed a teacher to death inside a Naperville nightclub, Daniel Olaska harassed two women and swore at a couple talking about the Super Bowl, prosecutors said Thursday as they sought to raise or revoke his $3 million bail.
Olaska, 27, is accused of fatally stabbing 24-year-old Spring Brook Elementary School teacher Shaun Wild early Saturday at Frankie's Blue Room in downtown Naperville.
Authorities said the stabbing happened hours after Olaska “verbally harassed” and followed two women as they danced and left the bar to smoke. At one point, he blocked one of the women from retrieving her jacket, prosecutors said. He also cursed at a couple as they discussed the Super Bowl between themselves, according to court records filed Thursday.
Prosecutors also cited a cryptic Machiavelli quote Olaska allegedly posted on Facebook: “[w]hen you disarm the people, you commence to offend them and show that you distrust them either through cowardice or lack of confidence, and both of these opinions generate hatred.” They noted, too, that Olaska's firearm permit had been revoked by Illinois State Police, who declined to give a reason.
“In this case, (Olaska) clearly poses a threat to the general public. He demonstrated that he is capable of extreme violence toward people that he has known for only a short time,” prosecutors wrote in a petition to raise or revoke bail. “Additionally, his social interactions at the bar indicate that (he) has rage boiling just beneath the surface of his personality.”
Authorities said Olaska erupted after he was ribbed about drinking beer from a wineglass by North Central College student Willie Hayes, who was seated at the same table. A frame-by-frame review of surveillance footage from different angles showed Wild standing at the head of the table with his back to Olaska when the defendant took a drink of beer and reached around Wild to stab Hayes in the lung, prosecutors said.
Olaska — who allegedly cut Wild's arm in the process — then took another drink and left the table.
As Olaska tried to leave the bar, prosecutors said, Wild followed and attempted to stop him. That's when the defendant turned and stabbed Wild in the chest with a 5- or 6-inch folding knife, according to the charges. Also injured was bouncer Rafael Castenada, who was stabbed as he and other bar staff wrested away Olaska's knife and restrained him until police arrived.
Prosecutors said the defendant initially lied to police, saying he had been stabbed. He later confessed, and admitted he was not acting in self-defense, authorities said.
Olaska, a supervisor at Schaumburg Regional Airport, made a brief appearance Thursday before DuPage County Judge Kathryn Creswell, who set Feb. 17 for a bail hearing. Until then, he will be held in the county jail without bond.
Olaska, of Naperville, did not speak in court Thursday but exchanged glances with his father, who clasped his hands together as if in prayer.
The judge also granted a request for him to be visited by a forensic psychiatrist while in custody.
Defense attorney Brian Telander said Olaska, who has no prior criminal history, has strong support from his family and church.
“This is a situation he never thought he'd find himself in,” Telander said. “And the community is just shocked. Everyone is rallying behind the guy because they can't believe this is him.”
Prosecutors said Olaska was placed on suicide watch at the county jail “due to his behavior” after his bond hearing Sunday. They also noted that Olaska has pilot training and works with small, privately owned airplanes available for flights out of the state and possibly the country.
Wild, a native of Brown Deer, Wis., was a 2011 graduate of North Central College in Naperville and a popular second-grade teacher at Naperville's Spring Brook Elementary School.