Judge rules cell tower data evidence allowed at Sycamore double murder trial

SYCAMORE – A DeKalb County judge ruled this month that cell tower data can be used as evidence in an expected double murder trial for the man accused in the 2016 slayings of Sycamore mother and son Patricia Wilson and Robert Wilson.

Judge Marcy Buick’s Dec. 4 ruling is the latest as slowed criminal proceedings for Jonathan Hurst, now 55 and formerly of Chicago, continue. Hurst is charged with 12 counts of first-degree murder, home invasion and burglary. If convicted, he faces a life sentence.

Prosecutors said the cell data proves Hurst was in Sycamore around the time Patricia A. Wilson, 85, and Robert J. Wilson, 64, were found bludgeoned to death inside their home at 16058 Old State Road on Aug. 15, 2016.

“There’s no indication that a cellphone was used in this incident,” Hurst’s defense attorney Chip Criswell said in argument.

Court records show a jury trial is tentatively slated for the final week of January. Prosecutors have subpoenaed a handful of police, an FBI agent and area residents, records show. A trial has been postponed more than once since Hurst’s February 2020 arrest.

In the time since, prosecutors have said Hurst’s defense team was unprepared for trial, while defense lawyers have said the evidence they need to review pretrial is immense.

Defense attorney Chip Criswell of the DeKalb County Public Defender’s Office argued this month that police unlawfully seized evidence from a nearby cellphone tower. He said that cell tower evidence collected during an investigation shouldn’t be used in Hurst’s trial.

Court records show a search warrant was conducted on a cellphone tower near the DeKalb County Sheriff’s Office, about 2.7 miles away from the Wilson home in Sycamore, Aug. 29, 2016. Data collected was through T-Mobile Metro PCS.

Loved ones of the Wilson family appeared in court this month to listen to the proceedings. Sisters of Patricia Wilson have regularly attended hearings since Hurst’s arrest four year ago, which was about four years after the killings. Patricia was remembered as an active member of St. John’s Lutheran Church of Sycamore. Robert, known affectionately as “Smiley”,was a lottery winner and the president of Sycamore Moose Lodge.

Hurst pleaded not guilty and has denied ever being in Sycamore. Police have said evidence shows he was at the the Wilson home before they were found dead, however. Authorities have not released a motive.

Substantial DNA samples detectives collected at the crime scene belong to Hurst, authorities allege. Patricia Wilson’s missing car was found nine days after the attack in Chicago on Stockton Avenue, a short walk from where Hurst lived at the time, police said.

And cell tower GPS data shows Hurst’s cellphone was in the Sycamore area at the time police suspect the Wilsons were killed. That’s a key point prosecutors said they plan to argue in trial.

Hurst’s defense’s team was unsuccessful in their attempts to get the cell data thrown out as evidence.

Criswell cited case law which he argued showed that police wrongfully seized T-Mobile cellphone data from the Sycamore cell tower without probable cause.

Lead prosecutor Scott Schwertley argued that the search warrant was a natural step in the police investigation, since it’s common for people to carry cellphones.

In the days following the Wilson killings, investigators used a search warrant signed by now retired Judge Robbin Stuckert to collect T-Mobile cellphone data from users in the area between 4:30 p.m. Aug. 14 to 8 a.m. Aug. 15.

In her Dec. 4 ruling, Buick cited what she called a “lengthy” affidavit by a sheriff’s detective which detailed their homicide investigation. Buick said police need probable cause – which requires a probability of a crime that happened, not that it happened beyond a reasonable doubt – for a search warrant.

She also dismissed Criswell’s arguments that the T-Mobile search warrant was too broad, ruling the warrant was instead “very narrowly tailored,” by investigators.

When police discovered Patricia Wilson’s car was missing from the home, they issued a search warrant of nearby cellphone tower data which would potentially show who was in the area the time of the killings.

Because, as prosecutors pointed out, Buick said, “generally nearly every person is in possession of a cellphone at all times.”

Hurst is expected to appear for another pretrial status hearing at 9:45 a.m. Jan. 2.