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Sep 24, 2008 6:14 pm US/Central
Woman Who Killed 3 In Suicide Attempt To Go Free
Victims' Families Furious
CHICAGO (CBS) ―
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Jeanette Sliwinski was convicted of reckless homicide for slamming her car into another vehicle in a failed suicide attempt, killing three people. She is set to be paroled Oct. 2.
CBS
A 26-year-old former model convicted of killing three men during a botched suicide attempt in 2005 will walk out of prison next week, and the victims' family members are furious.
Jeanette Sliwinski was found guilty in October 2007 of killing three musicians when she rammed her car into theirs at a Skokie intersection on July 14, 2005.
Musicians Michael Dahlquist, John Glick and Douglas Meis – all under 40 -- were in Skokie on a lunch break when Sliwinski slammed her car into theirs in a suicide attempt.
Prosecutors charged her with first-degree murder. But on Oct. 26, 2007, Judge Garritt Howard found her guilty of reckless homicide, a lesser charge. A jury found the former model guilty but mentally ill.
"Five psychiatrists testified that she had no criminal intent, and she was insane," Miller said. "There was contradictory evidence, but an experienced judge said reckless homicide, not murder."
Department of Corrections spokesman Derek Schnapp said Sliwinski, who is currently incarcerated at the Dwight Correctional Center, is scheduled to be released on parole on Oct. 2.
She was sentenced to eight years in prison last year, but has been in custody since July 1, 2005, Schnapp said. The law requires Sliwinski to serve only half her sentence.
For one year, Sliwinski will have to adhere to a specific set of parole guidelines but if she does, "We will no longer have supervision'' of her, Schnapp said. The parole period would officially end Oct. 2, 2009.
"It troubles me because it tends to diminish the loss of these gentlemen's lives," former Skokie Police Commander Brent Fowler said,
CBS 2's Kristyn Hartman spoke to some of the victims' family members Wednesday, who said for them, the turn of events is upsetting and devastating.
They want to know how someone sentenced to eight years could end up serving less than four.
"It's absolutely according to the law," CBS 2 Legal Analyst Irv Miller said. "Every prisoner does half the sentence."
At her sentencing last year, Scott Meis, 27, the younger brother of victim Douglas Meis, said, "It's just kind of ridiculous. Someone's going to walk away free after possibly two years -- a year and a half, two years -- in return for three innocent lives. Is that justice?"
As she was leaving that sentencing hearing, Rebecca Crawford, Glick's widow, said, "We're all very distraught."
Sliwinski's attorney says he understands the victims' families are in pain, but he says the judge in the case followed the law, which routinely cuts sentences for crimes other than murder.
Sliwinski also got credit for time served awaiting trial, as well as nine months off for good behavior and credit for counseling in prison.
Crawford said, "My husband and my friends were wonderful people who are sorely missed. I feel that the sentence itself is a crime, in and of itself."
"I hope Illinois sentencing laws can be changed," she added.
Miller says that's unlikely right now given the Illinois general assembly has lots of other matters on its plate.
But, over the last three decades punishments have gotten steeper, so anything is subject to change.
CBS 2's Kristyn Hartman and the STNG Wire contributed to this report.
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