Officer responsible for monitoring sex assault suspect suspended

CHICAGO (WLS) -- There is fallout from a report that found electronic monitoring procedures were not followed in the case of a 17-year-old charged with sexual assault.

A full audit of the program has been ordered and the officer responsible for this case is suspended. As the suspect, Aaron Parks, sits in the Cook County Jail, some are asking why he was allowed on the streets.

The news came in a phone call not from the courts, but from a friend. A father and family is feeling victimized again.

"It's like the initial incident, and this has brought her back to the beginning," said Robert Perkins, victim's father.

Robert Perkins said he wanted to speak Tuesday night because he's outraged that his daughter's accused rapist had apparently not been monitored as he should have been. The officer charged with that duty is now suspended.

"You can suspend him. You can fire him. But how does my daughter get that day back?" said Perkins.

The alleged attack happened last week near 98th and Indiana. Perkins' 24-year-old daughter, who is four months pregnant, was forced at knifepoint into her car, police say, and made to drive to an alley where she was sexually assaulted and robbed, then locked in the trunk of her car.

A juvenile is now in custody, 17-year-old Aaron Parks, who had been on home confinement for previous violent crimes: a July kidnapping of another woman and an April armed robbery.

"Should have been behind bars. Period," said Perkins.

In a statement Tuesday evening, the director of Cook County Juvenile Probation said Parks' GPS-based monitoring device should have been checked periodically to ensure he was home, but "... Electronic Monitoring procedures were not followed. The officer responsible for monitoring Mr. Marks has been placed on temporary suspension..."

"Who else is not being monitored? What are you all doing? Are you all training them properly?" said Perkins.

That director of juvenile probation has ordered a top-to-bottom review of the electronic monitoring program to determine if this case is isolated or if changes are needed system-wide.