At least two young black men are seen in a video that one of them posted to Facebook tormenting a senior citizen on a CTA Blue Line train in Chicago. They punch and slap him repeatedly, then turn around laughing and grinning into the camera. They slap him so hard you can hear the slaps. The poor victim holds his hands up at one point to protect himself. The horrible mistreatment goes on for over two minutes.
According to news station WBBM, the CTA issued this statement about the incident:
Though this crime apparently was not reported, because neither CTA nor Chicago Police have a report of the incident, we are pulling additional video to share with police as part of a now-open investigation,” the agency said. “We encourage members of the public who witness a crime to report it immediately, especially if they have evidence such as a video. Incidents like this are rare on the CTA.
Fortunately, community activist Andrew Holmes, who is also black, is attempting to discover the identities of the perpetrators, showing their photos around the community. WBBM has turned the video over to the police who are now investigating.
When WBBM asked the teen who made the video about the incident, he denied taking part in the assault himself, blaming it on racial slurs and saying, “I don’t know why they did what they did, I just recorded it because it was funny.” Funny? The parents of these teenagers should be ashamed of them and perhaps take a long hard look at whether they are raising these young men men well. Most likely if they had been appropriately supervised, instead of left alone to cruise around in packs on public transportation, this savage beating would have never taken place.
Watch the video: