‘Utterly barbaric’: State seeks maximum sentence for man’s hatchet attack on estranged wife in Crystal Lake

Mark Alex was perusing dating sites from around the world prior to committing an “utterly barbaric” attack on his estranged wife in her Crystal Lake apartment, a McHenry County prosecutor said Wednesday at Alex’s sentencing hearing.

In April, a jury found Alex, 61, guilty on two counts of attempted murder, Class X felonies. Alex, who lived in Mundelein at the time of the offense and has been in jail since his arrest March 6, 2022, faces 12 to 60 years in prison.

Authorities said that on March 5, 2022, he went to the home of his soon-to-be ex wife Wilma Alex, stopping first at The Home Depot in Algonquin to buy a hatchet and hammer.

Wilma Alex had filed for divorce nine months earlier but invited Mark Alex, a Polish-American truck driver, over to spend time with their son. However, when she turned down his romantic advances he attacked her, according to prosecutors and Wilma Alex’s testimony.

Though Wilma Alex was sitting in the courtroom Wednesday, Assistant State’s Attorney Ashur Youash read a statement from her:

“On a day in early March 2022, my life changed forever. I was nearly killed by the man who once stood beside me as my husband, Mark Alex. I will never forget that day, the fear in my heart, the pain in my body, and the realization that someone I loved and trusted was capable of such violence. It wasn’t just an attack on my body. It was an attack on my spirit, my safety, and my sense of self.”

Details of the attack are ingrained in her memory and her injuries go beyond “visible wounds” but include nightmares, flashbacks, anxiety, fear the difficulty trusting others. And then there was the trauma to her son, who was present.

Her son “witnessed the devastating consequences of his father’s actions, and that is a burden no child should ever have to bear,” her statement said.

Assistant State’s Attorney Ashley Romito asked for the maximum sentence of 60 years in prison. Mark Alex’s attorney Nicholas Feda asked for the minimum of 12. Judge Mark Gerhardt is due with a decision July 3.

Romito called Mark Alex’s attack on his estranged wife “utterly barbaric.” Afterward, he left her bleeding in her apartment alone with their toddler son.

“It did not matter [their] child was there,” Romito said, reminding the judge that he saw the images at trial of Wilma Alex bloodied from the multiple head wounds Mark Alex inflicted. The police body cam video also captured their 3-year-old son crying as first responders rushed to help her.

Mark Alex just left as “her life’s blood is ebbing,” Romito said. “He shows zero remorse except when he cries for himself.” She said he armed “himself with two weapons designed to end her life, which they nearly did.”

Crystal Lake police Detective Michael Maloney testified Wednesday that when he searched Mark Alex’s internet use, he found in the weeks prior to the attack that Alex had visited multiple dating sites. He searched for women locally and internationally including in Peru, Russia, Ukraine, Colombia and Mexico. He also searched a dating site for women in the Philippines, similar to how he connected with Wilma Alex after a Philippine dating site in 2014.

Maloney said that during his investigation, he did not find any signs of Wilma Alex mistreating Mark Alex or cheating on him, as Mark Alex had asserted.

Izabella Piwowarczyk, Mark Alex’s sister, also testified Wednesday, and Feda questioned her about Mark’s childhood growing up in Poland and his relationships with his past two wives and his four children. She said he grew up poor, “is a good man” and a caring, loving father who is “non-confrontational.” She said he suffers with depression and that when Wilma Alex filed for divorce, he had a nervous breakdown.

Feda asserted that although Wilma Alex filed for divorce “she vacillated.” Mark Alex is “a family man” who believed they would get back together and he would have his family back, Feda said.

Feda showed Gerhardt nearly 40 photographs of Mark Alex through the years. He asked the judge not to sentence Alex based on his actions the day of the attack but based on his entire life, and allow him the opportunity to be a part of his young son’s life.

With a translator, Mark Alex read a statement that began: “A second-rate newspaper made me look like a monster” and “prosecutors lied” and “police told half-truths.”

“I know I did bad. ... I hit a woman and that is deplorable and scandalous. ... I am paying for that. The question is why this situation took place,” Mark Alex said, adding that to know why, “I need a specialist.”

Alex said his ex-wife manipulated him and when she filed for divorce, he said he was “really shook up,” depressed, drinking alcohol and, for the first time, smoking marijuana.

He spoke of how much he loves his son and asserted that, had he wanted to kill Wilma, he would have “had to swung the hatchet the way the prosecutor said I did” or, “I could have bought a gun. I could afford it. But why would I destroy my life? I am asking for a [sentence] adequate with acts I committed, but not for attempted murder.”