Prospect Heights woman charged in fatal hit-and-run last October
A 20-year Prospect Heights woman has been charged with failing to report an accident causing death in the fatal hit-and-run of a Glenview man on Route 45 in Indian Creek in October.
Lake County sheriff's police Tuesday identified Amanda Cisneros-Elacio as the driver of an Audi Q5 that struck and killed Wojciech Glowik, 22, as he walked along Route 45 about 2 a.m. on Oct. 9.
Police found Glowik unconscious and critically injured. He died two days later.
Police at the time asked anyone seeing new damage to the front end of a white Audi SUV to call investigators. Days later, the vehicle suspected of striking and killing Glowik was identified by an alert Wheeling body shop employee and seized days later by sheriff's police.
The investigation took hundreds of hours and involved dozens of interviews, subpoenaed records for electronic data, records obtained via search warrant, review of video surveillance and other details, sheriff's police said.
It showed Cisneros-Elacio was responsible for striking Glowik and fleeing the scene, police said.
An arrest warrant for Cisneros-Elacio was issued Monday. She was taken into custody at her home on the 800 block of East Old Willow Road. She is being held in Lake County jail on $500,000 bail and would need to post $10% to be released. A status hearing is scheduled for Thursday.
Leaving the scene of an accident resulting in death is a Class 1 felony punishable by four to 15 years in prison, if found guilty. Additional charges are not anticipated, according to Lake County Sheriff's Office Deputy Chief Chris Covelli.
Covelli said Glowik had left a gathering from a home in the Vernon Hills area. He had been drinking and friends thought he was going to take a ride share home but it is unclear why he was walking, Covelli said.
Cisneros-Elacio was driving home from a friend's house in the Round Lake area. Because she did not report the crash and it was not discovered she was the driver until several days later, it could not be determined if she was driving under the influence, Covelli said.
Hit-and-run cases tend to take longer because investigators have to identify who was driving at the time of the crash. Extensive investigation is needed in the cause of death or serious injury, he added.
"We never want to sacrifice accuracy and completeness for speed," he said.
Sheriff John D. Idleburg said traffic crash investigators were relentless in the pursuit to find the person responsible for leaving the scene of the deadly crash.
"If the driver had only stopped and called for help, maybe the young man who died would have had an opportunity to survive," Idleburg said. "I hope this arrest provides the victim's family with the first steps toward closure."