Victims, survivors and relatives of those killed during the Highland Park July 4 parade shooting started telling their stories Wednesday in Lake County Court, either through the submission of victim-impact statements or by taking the witness stand during the sentencing hearing for Robert Crimo III.
Crimo, who pleaded guilty last month to killing seven and injuring dozens of others during the 2022 mass shooting, chose not to attend the start of the hearing and remained in the Lake County jail, where he has been since being arrested on the day of the tragedy.
The words of those who submitted statements or testified help paint a picture of the extent of the tragedy that shocked the community in and around Highland Park and Lake County, and allowed them to present their stories, “to the court and to history,” as State’s Attorney Eric Rinehart said last month.
What follows are some of those stories.
‘They were horrified’
Highland Park Police Cmdr. Gerald Cameron Jr., now retired, recalls working the parade the day of the shooting. He didn’t understand the sound he was hearing at first, but quickly realized it was gunfire.
Cameron, who drove shooting victims to the hospital himself several times because the ambulances were too busy, recalled encountering people attempting to perform CPR on a woman in a chair, who he would later learn was 63-year-old Jacquelyn Sundheim.
He also recalled finding a group of people, including children, who had locked themselves in a bike shop basement.
“They were reluctant to come out. They were reluctant to come to the door,” Cameron said. “They were horrified.”
‘Mom and Dad are going to come find me soon’
Dina Ruder Ring, who grew up in Highland Park, was at the parade with her husband and three children. When the gunfire began, Ruder Ring said she assumed it was kids setting off fireworks.
She was struck in the foot by shrapnel, but her family managed to flee to a parking garage.
It was there she found a woman carrying a young child, with both covered in blood. The blood wasn’t theirs, the woman said, and the child wasn’t hers, as she handed him off to Ruder Ring.
The family ultimately took the child with them during the chaos that followed the shooting, hoping to find his parents.
Ruder Ring said she asked the boy what his name was, but he would only say, “Mom and Dad are going to come find me soon,” she recalled. She would later learn the child was the son of Kevin and Irene McCarthy, who were killed in the shooting.
‘It was going to be bad’
Highland Park resident and doctor Jeremy Smiley had rescheduled his hospital shift the day of the shooting so he could attend the parade with his extended family. It was a tradition, and roughly 10 people, including his wife and three children, set themselves up at their usual spot.
When he heard the gunfire, Smiley said he picked up his daughter and shouted for his family to run. His family made it away safely, and Smiley had his wife drop him off at the hospital, knowing from the “sheer chaos” and number of shots, “It was going to be bad.”
Smiley would help treat then 8-year-old Cooper Roberts, who had been shot in the abdomen but ultimately survived. The sight of the young child so badly injured will stay with him “forever,” he said.
“There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think about Cooper,” Smiley said. “That initial feeling of seeing someone my kids’ age sick like that, that’ll never leave me.”
‘I knew it would probably be pretty horrible’
FBI Special Agent Mark Recca was on call the day of the shooting and looking forward to attending a different parade with his family. Instead, he ended up documenting the carnage after the shooting.
Recca, who has specialized training in evidence collection, said that after he was summoned to Highland Park, he drove from the north side of Chicago and ended up taking pictures of the extensive crime scene.
“I volunteered to be the photographer even though I knew it would probably be pretty horrible,” he said.
Recca said he photographed the five victims who died initially, and then ended up spending days at the scene, recovering evidence and trying to track the ricochets to find bullets.
He said he was one of the first law enforcement officers to arrive at the scene after the panicked crowd fled. The scene, Recca said, was almost “post-apocalyptic,” with strollers, shoes, purses and wallets, and other items abandoned along the parade route.
“There aren’t many times when you can go to the downtown of any city and see it absent of life or any people,” he said.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
