URBANA — A southern Wisconsin man is in jail, suspected in a string of vehicle vandalisms on a central Illinois interstate over the last several months that injured a toddler and an Urbana woman and scared motorists.
Illinois State Police at Pesotum issued a brief press release Saturday afternoon saying that Kevin Lee Casey, 53, from Janesville, was arrested Friday on preliminary charges of aggravated battery to a child, aggravated battery and criminal damage to property in connection with multiple shootings of vehicle windows that happened in Champaign, Vermilion and other counties that I-74 runs through, including in"numerous states to the east" of Illinois.
Police have released no details of where Casey was arrested or how they developed him as a suspect. Casey was booked in to the Champaign County Jail at 11:49 p.m. Friday. He is expected to be formally charged in Champaign County Circuit Court on Monday and State Police Capt. Louis Kink, commander of District 10 at Pesotum, plans a Monday news conference.
Although the reports started in District 10 around mid-March, the vandalisms were not made public until several weeks later when a Monticello woman took to Facebook to share that her 3-year-old son was cut by flying shards of glass about 5 p.m. on Wednesday, May 2, when their minivan window shattered somewhere between Neil Street and Prospect Avenue.
Her post prompted many others to come forward.
State police have declined to say how many vandalism and injury reports they have taken or to release any details of what they thought was happening.
Three weeks ago, Kink said they had received many calls and were trying to sort out those that may have been intentional vandalism from those caused by pieces of debris hitting windows.
As recently as Thursday, police put out a brief release that said they were taking the reports very seriously and continuing to investigate.
Champaign County State's Attorney Julia Rietz said she had not yet received reports from troopers to determine specific charges.
However, Casey will undoubtedly face at least a Class 3 felony charge of aggravated battery for those victims who were injured while on a public way. Penalties for that range from probation to two to five years in prison.