Parents of boy wounded in Joliet shooting plead guilty to lying, unlawful gun possession

The parents of a boy who was wounded in a 2018 shooting in Joliet have pleaded guilty to lying to a police detective and unlawful possession of a firearm.

The cases against Vanessa Casillas and Roberto Ortiz concluded on Dec. 10. Their 2-year-old son had been shot by occupants of an SUV on April 24, 2018, in the 400 block of Landau Avenue, according to Joliet police.

In June, Leonardo Ornelas pleaded guilty to shooting their son in the leg and he was sentenced to six years in prison. Prosecutors dropped an attempted murder charge.

Julian Guerra, Ornelas’ co-defendant, still faces an attempted murder charge in the case. His next court hearing is scheduled for Monday.

Casillas was initially charged with obstructing justice but she later pleaded guilty on Dec. 10 to a misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct, court records show.

Prosecutors said in a Dec. 10 court filing that Casillas told a Joliet police detective that she “discharged a firearm, knowing such information to be false.”

Judge Dan Rippy sentenced Casillas to a year of court supervision.

Ortiz pleaded guilty to aggravated unlawful use of a weapon. Rippy sentenced him to conditional discharge and credited him with two days already served in jail.

Prosecutors dropped charges of aggravated discharge of a firearm and obstructing justice against Ortiz. The latter charge accused Ortiz of lying to a detective by claiming it wasn’t him but Casillas who had fired a gun during the April 24, 2018, incident.

Al Roechner, who was the Joliet Police Chief at the time, told The Herald-News in 2018 that officers responded to a report of a 2-year-old who had been shot in the 400 block of Landau Avenue.

When officers arrived, Ortiz had already taken his child to Silver Cross Hospital in New Lenox, Roechner said. Casillas told police that the family was outside in their driveway when an SUV drove past the residence several times, he said.

The vehicle then stopped in front of the residence, and the passenger fired about four rounds at them, Roechner said.

Police learned that Ortiz had shot at the SUV responsible for the shooting but Casillas claimed she shot at the vehicle after shots were fired at her, according to Roechner.

“Vanessa would not come off her story,” Roechner said.