Another day, another woman being randomly attacked on a downtown Chicago street..
Police are looking for the man who randomly punched a woman on a busy downtown Chicago street Monday morning in what appears to be the latest in a growing string of unprovoked attacks that have sparked widespread concern and led the county’s top judge to warn court employees about the so-called “Loop Puncher” trend.
Monday’s attack occurred around 8 a.m. in the 600 block of North Rush Street, just south of Ohio Street, according to police and video posted online by the Chicago Critter account. The video shows a 43-year-old woman walking south on the sidewalk when a man hurries up behind her and delivers a powerful punch that sends her crashing to the sidewalk. The man keeps walking as the victim staggers to her feet. He briefly looks back and crosses the street.
An officer who responded to the scene said the attacker was described as a Black man in his early to mid-30s. No arrests have been announced.
Similar random attacks have been a problem for years, but the incidents are generating widespread attention lately thanks to social media videos of the assaults and the attackers.
Two men have been charged with random attacks on women lately. One remains jailed, while the other was released within hours of his arrest on September 30.
Last Thursday, Chief Judge Timothy Evans sent a memo to court staff about random attacks in the Loop, attaching two “facecards,” internal documents containing mugshots, criminal histories, and personal identifiers, for two men identified as potential threats. Each card featured the phrase “VIOLENT TENDENCIES” in red type under their mugshots.
Evans said the materials were prepared by the Office of Court Security “in response to growing concerns over recent physical attacks in the Loop, involving suspects referred to as ‘Loop Puncher.’” The memo, he said, was intended to “increase situational awareness and support your personal safety.”
One of the men profiled, 37-year-old Derek Rucker, was arrested on September 30 for allegedly striking a 23-year-old woman in the back of the head at the Loyola Red Line station. Prosecutors charged him with two counts of misdemeanor battery and he was released with a future court date of October 30.
Evans’ summary noted that Rucker has been arrested 38 times and convicted 18 times, describing a “repeated history of punching strangers” and identifying him as being “colloquially known on [social media] as ‘The Loop Puncher.’”
But, misdemeanor battery is not a detainable offense under Illinois’ cashless bail system. Under the previous bail system, a judge could have required a monetary bond to keep Rucker in custody pending trial.
The other man profiled in Evans’ email, 29-year-old William Livingston, was described as a “criminal gang member” with 29 arrests, 20 convictions, and a record of threatening police. CWBChicago previously reported that Livingston was charged in another random downtown attack earlier this year, a story that most major news outlets picked up after our story broke.
The string of assaults is drawing commentary from beyond the courthouse, too. On Tuesday, the Chicago Tribune’s editorial board called the incidents emblematic of a deeper failure in the city’s approach to mental health and public safety.
“Too often, those accused of violent outbursts are cycled through courts without the kind of intervention — mental health or otherwise — that could prevent the next attack,” the editorial said. “That leaves women to bear the burden of vigilance.”
The piece concluded, “No city can eliminate crime entirely. But a city that accepts women being struck at random as routine has lost something essential — its sense of care for its own.”
Original reporting you’ll see nowhere else, paid for by our readers. Click here to support our work.
