CHICAGO (WLS) — The wife of a man brutally beaten to death at a South Side bus stop spoke exclusively with ABC7 Chicago Wednesday.
Clementine Bradley recounts that her 76-year-old husband, who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, was at 95th and Halsted streets in Washington Heights when the incident transpired, although she is unsure why he was there.
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Bradley said she went out to watch the Bears game Monday night, and didn’t know her husband had even left the house.
She said, the next day the police came by to break the news of his death.
“She approached me with a photograph of my husband and asked if I recognized him. I responded, ‘Yes, that’s my husband, Joe Bradley.’ She then informed me, ‘Well, he’s deceased,'” Bradley recounted.
Bradley shares that she and her husband had recently marked their 41st wedding anniversary. She mentions that he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease a few years back, and in recent times, he had taken to sleeping in their basement.
“He had gone out the back door, and I didn’t even know. I left the house and went to watch the Bears game,” Bradley said.
According to Chicago police, a distressing encounter occurred between her husband and a 32-year-old man at a CTA bus stop near 95th and Halsted. CPD responded to the situation around 9:15 p.m. on Monday night.
Surveillance footage displays Bradley striking the suspect, though there is no audio and the events leading up to this incident remain unclear. The suspect retaliates by punching Bradley and pushing him to the ground.
ABC7 Chicago decided to pause the video due to its disturbing content, but the suspect continues to assault and kick Bradley several times before finally leaving the scene.
“They told me that a young man had beaten him to death, that they got in a fight. I don’t know what they could have been fighting about,” Bradley said.
Bradley described her husband as a kind, gentle man, never violent and not a fighter.
“That man was too old. He didn’t bother nobody. He didn’t bother nobody,” Bradley said. “You just don’t hear about somebody being beat to death, not no grown man.”
According to a police report obtained by the ABC7 I-Team, the same suspect continued his violent crime spree, allegedly carjacking an SUV and forcing a 14-year-old boy and 3-year-old girl from the vehicle.
The suspect eventually crashed in Schererville, Indiana.
He’s in custody there in Lake County. Charges have not yet been filed.
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