Murderer Jonathan Hurst asks judge to reconsider his life sentences for Sycamore Wilson killings

SYCAMORE – Jonathan D. Hurst has asked a DeKalb County judge to reconsider the two life sentences she handed him last month for the violent murders of Sycamore elderly mother and son Patricia Wilson and Robert Wilson, court records show.

Hurst’s defense lawyer, Chip Criswell of the DeKalb County Public Defender’s Office, filed a motion April 3 asking Circuit Court Judge Marcy Buick to reconsider Hurst’s consecutive life prison sentences. He appeared in court Wednesday for a status hearing on the motion.

Loved ones found the Wilsons beaten to death Aug. 15, 2016, at their rural Sycamore home. The man responsible, Hurst, 56, will spend the rest of his life in prison.

Authorities moved him from DeKalb County Jail in Sycamore, where he’d been held for more than five years after his February 2020 arrest without bail, the day after his March 20 sentencing. Buick also denied his request for a new trial.

As of Wednesday, Hurst has not yet been assigned to the prison – “his home institution,” Criswell called it – where he’s expected to serve out the sentences.

Hurst is currently being held at the Illinois Department of Correction’s Northern Reception and Classification Center in Joliet, Criswell said.

The facility is the primary adult male intake and processing center in Illinois for incarcerated men as they begin to serve out a sentence, according to IDOC. The Joliet center also houses the Stateville Minimum Security Unit.

“[Hurst] shifted to Department of Corrections the day after sentencing, and it usually takes about 30 days,” Criswell said.

Buick set a date for arguments in the motion to reconsider sentencing. Lead prosecutor Scott Schwertley agreed to the status date.

In her March ruling, Buick sentenced Hurst to life in prison on four counts of first-degree murder – two each for Patricia and Robert. He won’t be eligible for parole or release. Buick also handed down a 30-year sentence, the maximum, for one count of home invasion.

A jury found Hurst guilty on Jan. 30 after a lengthy criminal trial. It came more than eight years after Sue Saari and her husband, Mike Saari, found the Wilsons on Aug. 15, 2016, dead inside their rural Sycamore home, 16058 Old State Road.

Authorities believe the mother and son were bludgeoned to death with a “hammer-like” weapon sometime on the night of Aug. 14. Patricia, 84, was found lying facedown in the basement laundry room, half inside a crawlspace next to the washer and dryer. She died first, forensic pathologist Dr. Mitra Kalelkar testified. Robert, 64, beaten and also stabbed multiple times, was found face-up sprawled on the stairs.

At the sentencing, Nancy Strever, 89, Patricia’s older sister and Robert’s aunt, said the horrors of the day will never leave her family.

Strever lamented that her family never figured out why Hurst – who had no known ties to Sycamore and denied being in the Wilson home despite DNA and fingerprint evidence placing him there – bludgeoned her loved ones to death. He’s denied his involvement and did not testify in his defense. He did not speak at the sentencing hearing either.

Hurst, at his request, Criswell said, is expected to participate in the hearing from prison via Zoom at 9 a.m. May 1.