A Chicago-area man has been charged with a hate crime after allegedly yelling anti-LGBTQ+ slurs at train passengers before stabbing and robbing them, police said.
Leondess Williams, 36, is accused of approaching a group of two young men and one woman dancing together on the Chicago Transit Authority’s (CTA) Orange Line Archer station just after midnight on Saturday and saying, “Y’all gay asses deserve to get robbed,” CWBChicago reported.
He then allegedly stabbed an 18-year-old male in the head while shouting more slurs and demanding his wallet, the outlet said of the police report.
When the 18-year-old only gave up his phone and not his wallet, Williams allegedly punched his friend, a 19-year-old male, and stole his money and phone before fleeing.
It is unclear if he also targeted the woman the two men were with.
Police were able to track Williams by following the GPS location on one of the stolen phones, the report said.
Cops confronted Williams “a short distance from the train station,” and recovered the phones and a knife.
The victims positively identified him as their attacker and declined offers to be taken to a hospital for medical attention.
Williams has since been charged with two counts of armed robbery, two counts of hate crime, two counts of aggravated battery in a public place, aggravated battery with a deadly weapon, and aggravated battery of a peace officer.
Court records that CWBChicago obtained reveal that Williams was already the focus of a pending misdemeanor assault case stemming from a March 12 incident in which he allegedly threatened a woman with a knife at a Cicero, Illinois, school.
After he failed to show up in court in June for that case, the judge reportedly instructed his clerk to mail him a notice to remind him of his court appearance instead of issuing an arrest warrant.
This time around, Judge Lindsay Huge detained Williams pending trial.
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