WAUKEGAN, Ill. — The man who opened fire at a Fourth of July parade near Chicago in 2022, killing seven people and leaving behind an “ocean of grief,” will spend the rest of his life behind bars with no possibility of parole, a judge said Thursday.
Robert E. “Bobby” Crimo III, 24, was a no-show in court Thursday and declined to make a statement to the court, his lawyer said.
It did not appear that any relatives of the killer’s family attended the sentencing.
“The court finds he’s irrevocably depraved,” Judge Victoria Rossetti said as she handed down the maximum sentence. “He is beyond any rehabilitation.”
Crimo pleaded guilty last month to charges in the mass shooting that wounded nearly 50 more people in addition to the seven deaths.
The July 4, 2022, parade in Highland Park was about 30 miles outside Chicago.
“In the middle of that joy, in the middle of that celebration, 83 shots rang out over 40 seconds. Eighty-three attempts to hurt people, do as much damage as possible. Eighty-three attempts to kill. Eighty-three attempts to reduce light in the world,” Lake County State’s Attorney Eric Rinehart said. “He intended to end the happiness he saw around him. “
The seven people killed by Crimo were Stephen Straus, 88; Nicolas Toledo-Zaragoza, 78; Eduardo Uvaldo, 69; Katherine Goldstein, 64; Jacquelyn Sundheim, 63; and married couple Kevin McCarthy, 37, and Irina McCarthy, 35. Cooper Roberts, then 8, was shot and paralyzed.
Some in the court sobbed and hugged one another as Rinehart summed up the mass trauma left by that shooting.
“I cannot attempt to rein in the pain, ocean of grief, trauma, heartache and loss,” Rinehart said.
A mourner visits a memorial for the victims of the shooting in Highland Park.Jim Vondruska / Getty Images file
Thursday’s hearing was a continuation from Wednesday when more than a dozen witnesses testified, recalling the horrors of that day nearly three years ago.
John Kezdy and wife Erica Weeder survived their physical wounds from that day, but were left with permanent emotional scars, she said.
“Because of this mass shooting, this act of terror,” Weeder testified Thursday, “I and my children and entire community now know no one is ever really safe.”
Kezdy, a punk rocker-turned-state prosecutor, was killed a year later in a bicycle accident.
Weeder said she’s still nervous about driving and hearing loud noises from construction sites.
“John and I willed ourselves to minimize the impact of shooting on our lives,” Weeder said.
Robert E. Crimo III at the Lake County Courthouse in Waukegan, Ill., on May 29, 2024.Nam Y. Huh / AP file
After his capture, Crimo told police he was trying to avoid shooting children, targeting adults and aiming for the “chest up.”
Life without the possibility of parole is the most severe punishment Crimo faced as Illinois doesn’t have capital punishment.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Samira Puskar reported from Waukegan and David K. Li from Los Angeles County
