Downstate State's Attorneys? The Department of Corrections? The governor maybe?
Authorities have charged a Joliet man on parole for murder with the slaying of a 79-year-old Hyde Park resident who Thursday afternoon had just left a fast-food restaurant where he picked up chicken for a Christmas Eve party.
Police say Lee Cration, 48, waited for Ralph Elliott to leave a a Popeye's restaurant, then came up to him as he tried to get in his car. Cration allegedly struggled with Elliott, then shot him in the face and back. He rummaged through Elliott's pockets before fleeing, police said.
Seventy-nine years old, married to the same woman for 54 years, childless but very involved in his extended family with a nephew who is CPD, and he gets killed by some piece of shit who probably shouldn't have even been on the street. Read this:
- Records show he was paroled in November 2008 from prison, where he had been held since 1985 for a murder a year before. He also was convicted in 2001 and 2005 of aggravated battery of a peace officer. In the earlier incident, he assaulted at least two prison guards at Pinckneyville Correctional Center who tried to get him to remove personal property from his cell. Officials at the time said Cration had "an extensive history of violence, including ten staff assaults and one inmate assault along with five 'dangerous disturbances,' " according to an Associated Press story.
Sentenced to 28 years for homicide with multiple behavior problems in prison? Including attacks on guards? And he still earned time off for "good behavior?" He should have been caged until 2013 on the murder charge and the Aggravated Battery charges should have run consecutively, not concurrently. What penalty is there in having a concurrent sentence? None that we can see.
Which all means Mr. Elliot could have had another 4 years of a life well lived at the minimum. Or at least stood a better chance of dying at home in his own bed with his wife of 58 years at his side instead of on the tarmac of a Popeye's restaurant in the cold and wet of a Chicago Christmas.
What a fucking shame.
Which all means Mr. Elliot could have had another 4 years of a life well lived at the minimum. Or at least stood a better chance of dying at home in his own bed with his wife of 58 years at his side instead of on the tarmac of a Popeye's restaurant in the cold and wet of a Chicago Christmas.
What a fucking shame.
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