A jury was selected Tuesday in Will County with opening arguments planned for Wednesday morning in the trial of an Orland Park man charged with reckless homicide in a 2017 car crash that killed a pregnant woman and her three young sons in Beecher.
Judge Daniel Rippy said the trial could be finished later this week or early next week.
Woulfe, 27, is charged with reckless homicide in the July 24, 2017, crash at Corning Road and Yates Avenue. Woulfe, who is free on bond while awaiting trial, was traveling east when he sped through a stop sign and slammed into a car carrying Lindsey Schmidt and her sons, prosecutors said. Schmidt was pregnant at the time.
Schmidt and her 19-month old son, Kaleb, were pronounced dead at the scene. Four-year-old Weston died at Comer’s Children Hospital in Chicago the following evening and 6-year-old Owen died two days later, also at Comer’s.
A Will County grand jury indicted Woulfe on 16 counts in September 2017. Rippy upheld the indictment in a 2019 ruling.
Rippy listed about two dozen witnesses for the trial, including Norberto Navarro, who witnessed the accident in 2017, but about two years was found guilty of a federal drug charge. He has served his time for the charge but has been in a Will County jail for about two months.
Earlier this month, an attorney for Navarro argued for his release on recognizance and to seek a visa so Immigration and Customs Enforcement authorities do not deport Navarro.
The court allowed the visa
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but set a $1 million bond, which he cannot afford to pay.Just more than a dozen people gathered outside the courthouse Tuesday morning protesting and demanding the release of Navarro. They chanted in English and Spanish “si se puede” and “free Norberto” for passersby and people inside the courthouse to hear.
“We continue to push for Will County to do the right thing and not cooperate with ICE and release him,” said Rebecca Guterman, one of Navarro’s attorneys.
“They want to deport my son,” Navarro’s mother, Aida Navarro, said in Spanish.
Sarah Southey, a legal coordinator for the Centro De Trabajadores Unidos group behind the rally, said they expect some announcement Tuesday or Wednesday, pending Navarro’s testimony.