Kim Foxx's Failures Are Costing Innocent Lives

OAK LAWN, IL — I’m writing this letter in response to Cook County State's Attorney Kim Foxx’s dismissive response to our community’s outrage over the tragic killing of a beautiful young girl, a death that could have been – and should have been – prevented.

For those unfamiliar, on January 21st a 27-year-old man named Daniel Regaldo was driving drunk and crashed his car head-on into a car carrying Oak Lawn resident Cyrus Robinson and his 12-year-old daughter Cire. Cire was killed in the collision and her father was seriously injured.

Regaldo’s blood-alcohol content was a mind-boggling .457, or almost 600% higher than the legal limit. More mind-boggling still was that Regaldo was even on the street given his extensive criminal record. He was arrested for the first time at age 17 and by the time he was 22, and at the time of Kim Foxx’s first election, he had been arrested 14 different times on 24 different charges including attempted murder, unlawful use of a weapon, and multiple battery charges.

Since Kim Foxx has been in office, he was arrested 10 more times and charged with an additional 21 crimes, including assault, weapons charges, and serious drug offenses. Finally, after a drug arrest in November 2019, he was sentenced to a year in jail, yet amazingly he was on the streets and arrested 2 months later (in January) – for DUI – and again 6 months after that for a standoff with SWAT in Oak Park where he fired a gun.

Rational people everywhere should find this situation utterly unacceptable, and no one more so than the people we elect to keep us safe from habitual criminals like Daniel Regaldo. Like Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx.

Kim Foxx is the "State's" Attorney, not the “Criminals'” Attorney. She is responsible for prosecuting criminals and protecting victims, but she instead presides over a revolving-door justice system where concern for victims has given way to concern for criminals. Her catch-and-release policies set a violent offender free multiple times causing the death of an innocent young girl and leaving her loved ones and friends shattered.

When I brought this situation to the attention of our community and called for Kim Foxx to resign, she accused me of trying to “exploit Cire’s death for political purposes”. That's right, instead of taking responsibility and committing to addressing the problem, Kim Foxx projects onto others, denies responsibility, and deflects blame. In this instance, she tried to blame "the courts", which is absurd because Daniel Regaldo's criminal history demonstrates a pattern where charges were dropped, deferred, or he was given community service.

To be perfectly clear, I don’t have an agenda, political or otherwise. I have served 2 terms as Oak Lawn's Mayor and chose not to run again. My term ends in a few months. But when I was elected, I swore an oath to the people I serve - people like the Robinson family - to work for them, protect them, and be their voice on issues important to them.

Kim Foxx swore a similar oath, but instead of prosecuting criminals and protecting innocents, she chose a new social experiment that has been an undeniable failure, a failure that led to Cire Robinson's death. Instead of using her incredible power to advocate for victims, she chooses to be an advocate for criminals.

I stand by my call for Kim Foxx to resign, and feel even more strongly about it today given her refusal to acknowledge a problem exists, and because of her shocking lack of compassion for victims like Cire Robinson, and for Cire's family and friends who have to live with the emotional wreckage of these failed policies, with little hope that justice will be done.

Cook County needs a State’s Attorney who acts as a voice for victims and everyday law-abiding citizens. And it can't happen soon enough.