Joliet's 'Cold Justice' Murder Defendant Gil Bernal Wins Freedom Under SAFE-T-Act: Judge Smigielski Rules

JOLIET, IL — Long-time Will County Judge Art Smigielski announced that 82-year-old Joliet first-degree murder defendant Gil Bernal definitely does not pose a flight risk under the Illinois SAFE-T-Act standard, and the judge also found that more than 23 years have passed since the last allegation of violence against him.

On Tuesday afternoon, Judge Smigielski made his ruling: the Flint, Michigan man will be released from the Will County Jail under the SAFE-T-Act, despite being charged in Joliet with committing first-degree murder. The disappearance and murder of Joan Bernal, Gil Bernal's wife, happened 38 years ago, in December 1988.

The judge's ruling, however, will restrict Bernal to 24 hour a day home confinement and Bernal will be placed on electronic monitoring through the Will County Pre-trial Services program.

Judge Smigielski announced that Bernal will be required to reside in the state of Illinois while his murder case is pending. He cannot return to his current home back in Flint, Michigan, where he has lived since around 2018. Judge Smigielski declared that Bernal won't be let out of the Will County Jail until his family surrenders his passport. Lead defense attorney Dave Carlson believed they could accommodate the judge's request within the next 24 hours.

"Defendant will be granted pretrial release," Judge Smigielski declared.

In making his ruling, Judge Smigielski noted that there were several people who asked the sheriff's office, during the recent re-investigation, whether Bernal was still alive and they were apparently still afraid of him. The judge acknowledged that Bernal has had a long-standing pattern of abusive violence and domestic abuse, from the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s and possibly up to 2003.

The judge also informed everyone that he must take into account Bernal's criminal history, and the judge revealed that it is insignificant: Bernal had one misdemeanor and one traffic offense.

Last Wednesday morning, Gilbert Bernal's daughter, Sarita Woerheide, was called to the front of Courtroom 405 by the Will County Assistant State’s Attorney Jonathon Sakellaropoulos, and she implored Judge Smigielski to keep her father in the Will County Jail as part of the Illinois SAFE-T-Act.

Sarita was only 2 years old when her mother vanished. The family lived on the east side of Joliet at 113 Zarley Boulevard, in the Preston Heights area.

"He never had a kind word or good thing to say about my mother," Sarita testified on Wednesday in Courtroom 405. She described her father as being the real-life version of the famous novel, "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde."

"Angry Mr. Hyde, it is my father," Sarita told the courtroom. Once, when Sarita was a teenager, she said her father slapped her so hard she hit the wall and lost control of her bladder. "The father I loved was completely gone. This was not an isolated incident. "He believes he was justified in doing that. His anger entitles him to harm others."

Sarita informed Judge Smigielski that releasing her father back to return to his home in Flint, Michigan, while awaiting his first-degree murder trial, would endanger her, as well as many others. She said that her father, over the years, has told the family countless stories about how he regularly physically abused Joan Bernal before her disappearance. "Almost like a badge of honor for the man," Sarita testified.

"For the safety of me and my family and the community, I ask that my father remains detained pending trial."

Feb. 4 marked the SAFE-T-Act detention hearing for Bernal. Prosecutors at the Will County State's Attorney's Office identified at least 10 to 12 different witnesses, going to back to the 1970s, who suggested that Gilbert Bernal is very violent, abusive and dangerous. Bernal and his wife Joan lived on Joliet's east side, in the 100 block of Zarley Boulevard. December 1988 was the last time she was ever seen alive. She was a bus driver for Joliet's PACE transit service while Gilbert Bernal worked as a diesel mechanic at the bus barn off South Chicago Street.

"Let's cut to the chase, none of it has to do with alleging murder," Bernal's criminal defense lawyer Dave Carlson argued. Carlson suggested the prosecution portrayed his client as a bad dad and a bad guy, a bad human, "but we don't do justice that way in criminal cases, we do facts. There is no evidence presented as to murder. There is no specificity."

Last week, Carlson explained that Will County's criminal justice system does not convict people of first-degree murder based on conclusions reached by viewers watching cable television shows or from listening to true-crime podcasts. The Joan Bernal case, in recent years, was featured by both.

The Joan Bernal murder case drew national acclaim last year when the Oxygen Network's "Cold Justice" true-crime show aired a one-hour segment profiling the Will County Sheriff's Office efforts to reopen the investigation into Joan Bernal's Joliet disappearance in the late 1980s.