Lake County State's Attorney race between Eric Rinehart, Mary Cole heats up in week before election

LAKE COUNTY, Ill. (WLS) -- Just eight days before the 2024 election, the race for state's attorney in Lake County, Illinois, is shaping up to be a contentious one.

Eric Rinehart is finishing his first term as the county's first Democratic state's attorney in decade. He is being challenged by Republican Mary Cole.

Despite a spike in crime in 2022 as a result of the Highland Park parade shooting, Rinhart said violent crime is down this year compared in last.

"Gun violence is down 40% in Waukegan, North Chicago and Zion. This is from law enforcement data. This is from ShotSpotter data," he said.

Rinehart said a new $5 million gun prevention program is working. He also said homicides are down by almost half compared to 2023.

"I'll be frank, statistics like that mean nothing to Valeria Rodriguez's family," said Cold in response.

Cole is highlighting the July murder of 15-year-old Valeria Rodriguez, who was eating dinner in her Round Lake Beach home when she was struck by a bullet fired from a park across the street.

A neighbor, Shorbonia Poole, was charged with murder. The 19-year-old was supposed to be on electronic home monitoring from a previous armed robbery charge at the time.

"Had the state's attorneys done their job, he wouldn't have been on the streets and she would still be alive," Cole said.

Rinehart said two veteran prosecutors cut a plea deal that included four years of probation and two years of electronic home monitoring.

"These were incredibly experienced prosecutors who worked with the victim of the first case, who worked with the detective in the first case, and who presented this to a judge after the offender had been in jail for seven months," he said.

Besides accusing Rinehart on being soft on crime, Cole said there has been a high turnover rate in the Lake County State's Attorney's office. She is among those who have quit.

"That's not true, we've increased the number of domestic violence prosecutors, so the case load is lower, we built the first ever violent crime unit," Rinehart responded.

"You can make as many positions as you want, but if you can't keep those people to do the jobs, it doesn't matter," said Cole.

With one week to go, both candidates have well funded campaigns. They plan to make their case to voters by using advertising, door knocking, phone banking and meeting Lake County Residents.