A Cary man convicted in 1994 of attempted murder in Cook County and acquitted of murder as a teen in 1980 has been charged with a sixth DUI, according to court records.
George G. Gnewuch, 64, is charged with aggravated driving under the influence, a Class X felony, as well as driving with a revoked license and leaving the scene of an accident, according to a criminal complaint filed against him in McHenry County court.
According to authorities, at about 6:40 p.m. on Dec. 1, Gnewuch drove his pickup truck eastbound on Route 14 near The Hollows Conservation Area in Cary too fast and crashed into another vehicle. He left the scene without attending to the person in the other vehicle, the complaint said.
Gnewuch’s alcohol level was .168, more than twice the legal limit of .08, according to a police report. The complaint also stated that he drove about three miles away from the crash while his truck was missing a front tire. He allegedly smelled of alcohol and told police he had been drinking and should not be driving, the police report said.
According to court records, Gnewuch’s past DUI offenses occurred in Cook County in 1984, 1985, 1991, 2003 and 2004.
Records show McHenry County judges have recused themselves from hearing the current case against Gnewuch, and the Illinois Supreme Court reassigned the matter to be heard by a Kane County judge. Courthouse administration and the judges said they personally know the alleged victim in the case, creating a conflict. It is not clear if he has had an initial appearance before a judge on the latest DUI charge.
In 1994, Gnewuch was convicted of attempted murder in connection with a 1992 attack of a woman in her Schaumburg home, according to reporting in the Chicago Tribune at the time and Cook County records. Gnewuch entered the home of the woman, who was a neighbor, and “repeatedly slashed” her face and body with a knife after she asked him to turn down his stereo, according to the report.
In 1980, Gnewuch was found not guilty of murder by a McHenry County jury in the death of Karen J. Cheshier, according to a story in the Daily Crystal Lake Herald from 1980.
Cheshier was a 34-year-old married mother of three who lived in the Fox River Valley Gardens subdivision in Port Barrington. Gnewuch also lived in the neighborhood at the time; he was 16 and had been a babysitter in the Cheshier home, according to a 1978 story in the Daily Sentinel in Woodstock,
Police said Cheshier’s attacker entered the home through a back window and bludgeoned her to death with a carpenter’s claw hammer while she was in her bed, according to the Sentinel. Her husband was out of town on business during the attack and her nude body was discovered in her bed by her children, the Sentinel reported; the murder weapon had been found outside the home.
Though he was later acquitted, authorities had said at the time that Gnewuch was “a prime suspect” in the murder. Because he was a juvenile, he was initially taken into custody of a Lake County juvenile detention center and later moved to McHenry County jail and tried as an adult. He remained in the county jail until his acquittal, according to the Daily Crystal Lake Herald story.
In the 1986, Gnewuch was convicted in another attempted murder that occurred in Des Plaines and was sentenced to six years in prison, according to the Tribune story and records in Cook County courts. He was paroled from Vandalia Correctional Center on Aug. 30, 1988, and discharged from parole three years later, according to the Illinois Department of Corrections.
Gnewuch did not have an attorney listed in McHenry County court records.