Violent Joliet Man Must Remain In Detention: Prosecutors

JOLIET, IL — A 45-year-old Joliet man with a long criminal history must remain incarcerated in the Will County Jail following his latest arrest, this time by the Joliet Police Department for eight charges of battery, domestic battery and aggravated battery.

A Will County judge ruled in favor of the Will County State's Attorney's Office of Jim Glasgow in regard to the March 20 arrest of Vincent Turner, who lived in the 500 block of Elmwood Avenue.

According to the petition to deny Turner's pretrial release, Joliet police were called to the 1200 block of Gage Court on March 20 for a disturbance. Two women in the yard told officers that Turner moved into their house without their permission.

According to court documents, that day, Turner began yelling, "I am going to kill y'all. This my mother f****** house." Once Turner entered the house, he punched the 68-year-old woman who owned it, and she fell to the ground.

Then, according to the petition, Turner started kicking her as she lay on the ground. Another woman at the house tried to pull Turner off of her mother, and that is when Turner began to hit her. Turner pushed the second woman to the ground and kicked her as well, the petition alleges.

After Joliet police arrested Turner, they say he granted them an interview and told them how he had been at the house on Gage Court for the past 90 days and that the 68-year-old woman allowed him to stay there even after he and the woman's daughter split up. Turner maintained that it was the 68-year-old woman who charged at him and that he moved out of the way, causing her to fall to the ground. Turner told the officers that the second woman also fell to the ground somehow, according to court records.

"Finally, defendant told officers that at no time did he touch either female," prosecutors told the judge.

According to Joliet police, the 68-year-old woman suffered a swollen forehead with a knot and the second woman suffered a swollen right eye, bruises, scratches to her shin, red marks on the side of her face and abrasions to her forehead.

A Joliet police crime scene investigator took photographs of the injuries to both women.

As for Turner, he has prior convictions for two gun offenses, aggravated discharge of a gun in 2012 in Will County and reckless discharge of a gun, in Will County, from 2000. He also has convictions in Will County for aggravated battery to a police officer from 1995 and aggravated assault from 1998.

"It is alleged that the defendant's pretrial release poses a real and present threat to the safety of any person or persons in the community," argued Will County's prosecutors in their successful petition to keep Turner locked away in the Will County Jail during the pretrial phase of his eight criminal charges.