New details are coming to light about a suspect in a shooting in suburban Dolton last week that left four people wounded outside of an AutoZone.
According to authorities, one of the suspects in the shooting is 30-year-old Torrey Lewis.
The Cook County Sheriff's Office says Lewis was found shot and injured in the passenger seat of a stolen silver Nissan Maxima, where police also discovered a rifle and handgun.
Lewis is a part of the Sheriff's Electronic Monitoring program. He is charged in the 2017 murder of Timothy Horace, a paralyzed man confined to a wheelchair who was shot and killed outside of a movie theater in Country Club Hills.
Police arrested and charged Lewis in the murder in 2018.
While Lewis was awaiting the start of his murder trial in 2020, a judge allowed him to go on electronic monitoring.
“Here’s another case of someone who, while the device is off, goes out and commits crimes," Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart told NBC Chicago.
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Dart says a lesser-known provision of the SAFE-T Act, a criminal justice reform measure passed in 2021, allows anyone in Illinois on electronic monitoring to shut off their device for two days each week to conduct "basic activities" such as grocery shop, attend job interviews or religious events.
Dart said Lewis was on one of his "free movement" days and was not monitored in real-time during the Dolton shooting.
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After the shooting, the Sheriff's office was able to go back and track his movements that day.
Authorities learned that Lewis left his home at around 9 a.m. and hit speeds of 107 miles per hour on expressways before coming to a stop at the Dolton AutoZone.
“We just have people going wherever they want for two days for reasons we never understood," Dart said. “People are getting hurt."
Dart said he is pushing the legislature to take a closer look at the electronic monitoring measure in the SAFE-T Act.
"People need to wake up and say ‘listen, we got some parts of the law really right. Things are working well, things are good. This part is not working well we need to change it,'" he said.
He also believes the electronic monitoring program should be reserved for non-violent offenders.
According to the Cook County Sheriff's Office, there are currently 1,664 individuals on electronic monitoring countywide, with 120 of those people charged with murder or attempted murder. Another 1,300 people are charged with other violent offenses such as unlawful use of weapons, or sexual assault and abuse.
