Joseph Czuba is a killer from Illinois who would murder a six year old boy, Wadee Alfayoumi, and injuring the child’s mother
According to court documents Joseph Czuba would target Wadee Alfayoumi and his mother due to their ethnic background. Wadee Alfayoumi and his mother were living inside of Joseph Czuba home. Czuba would force his way into their room and stabbed the pair multiple times killing the little boy
Joseph Czuba would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to fifty three years in prison
Joseph Czuba Case
An Illinois landlord who fatally stabbed a six-year-old Palestinian-American boy and severely wounded his mother has been sentenced to 53 years in prison.
Joseph Czuba, 73, was convicted for murder and hate crimes for the death of Wadee Alfayoumi, and the wounding of his mother in 2023 shortly after the start of the Israel-Gaza war.
The family had been tenants in Czuba’s home in Plainfield, roughly 40 miles from Chicago. Prosecutors said he targeted them over their Muslim faith.
Czuba had pleaded not guilty, but jurors convicted him after deliberating for less than 90 minutes.
The trial included testimony from Alfayoumi’s mother, who described the encounter in harrowing detail, and from Czuba’s now ex-wife, who said he had grown agitated by the war.
On the day of the attack, he forced his way into the home of the Alfayoumi family who had been renting rooms from him and attacked them with a knife, prosecutors said.
He stabbed the mother over a dozen times, prosecutors said, then turned towards the boy and stabbed him 26 times.
“If it wasn’t enough that this defendant killed that little boy, he left the knife in the little boy’s body,” a Will County assistant state’s attorney told the jury.
Last words of knifed US Muslim boy were 'Mom, I'm fine'
Illinois man convicted for hate crime murder of Palestinian boyEvidence during trial included graphic crime scene photos and police saying they found Czuba outside the house after the attack with his body and hands covered in blood.
Czuba did not speak during the trial.
The deadly attack received national attention and renewed concerns of Islamophobia and anti-Muslim discrimination.
Alfayoumi’s funeral drew large, overflowing crowds, and officials in his Plainfield hometown dedicated a park playground in his honour.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjew8p8l2lgo
Joseph Czuba Death
An Illinois man who was sentenced to 53 years in prison for the murder of a young Palestinian American boy in a 2023 hate crime that shocked the nation has died in prison, authorities said Saturday.
Joseph Czuba, 73, died on Thursday while serving his sentence, the Will County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement. Officials did not release his cause of death.
In February, Czuba was convicted of first-degree murder, attempted murder, aggravated battery and hate crimes for fatally stabbing 6-year-old Wadee Alfayoumi and injuring the boy’s mother just days after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attacks in Israel and the launch of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.
Authorities said Czuba targeted the boy’s family “due to them being Muslim and the ongoing Middle Eastern conflict involving Hamas and the Israelis.” The mother and son were living in a room rented in Czuba’s home in Plainfield Township, a suburb of Chicago.
Czuba stabbed the young boy 26 times and attacked the boy’s mother, Hanan Shaheen, leaving her critically injured with 12 stab wounds, according to officials.
Czuba was sentenced 53 years in prison for killing Wadee and attacking Shaheen, after pleading not guilty.
Shaheen, who moved to the U.S. from the West Bank as a teenager nearly 15 years ago, testified that in the days before the stabbings, Czuba told her “your people” are killing Jewish people. Czuba also demanded that she and her son move out of his home, she said.
She added that she and her son had no prior issues with Czuba in the roughly two years they lived in the home, where she and her son shared a kitchen and living room with Czuba and his then-wife.
On the day of the attacks, she testified that Joseph Czuba barged his way into her room, held her down and stabbed her more than a dozen times. She said Czuba put his fingers in her mouth at one point and tried breaking her teeth. Throughout the encounter, Shaheen said she pulled at Czuba’s hair while he shouted, “You must die!”
Her son stood in the corner of the room and watched the encounter fearfully, Shaheen testfied.
Joseph Czuba told the young boy, “Wadee, I will take care of you. I will raise you,” and, “Don’t tell people I killed your mom,” as he stabbed his mother, Shaheen said.
Shaheen said she then escaped to the bathroom and called 911 while she could hear Czuba stabbing her son.
“He is killing my baby,” she said repeatedly to the dispatcher, according to a recording of the 911 call played at the trial.
An attorney for Shaheen did not immediately return a request for comment.
The boy’s father said Saturday that he felt no satisfaction from Czuba’s death.
“My son is gone. The justice is that I need my son back,” Oday Al Fayoume said in his first public comments. “This is the only justice for me. There is nobody who can give me that.”
He said Joseph Czuba got off easy after only serving five months of a 53-year sentence. “He killed my son,” Al Fayoume, said, adding that more people may be emboldened to attack Palestinians across the U.S. because of Czuba’s actions.
Wadee’s killing stunned the nation and drew national condemnation at a time when tensions around the country’s Muslim and Jewish communities were intensifying after the Oct. 7 attacks.
Then-President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris issued statements condemning the killing, saying that “this horrific act of hate has no place in America.”
“The child’s Palestinian Muslim family came to America seeking what we all seek — a refuge to live, learn, and pray in peace,” he said.
Ahmed Rehab, the executive director of Council on American-Islamic Relations’ Chicago office, said in a statement on Saturday that “this depraved killer has died, but the hate is still alive and well.”
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/man-killed-palestinian-boy-wadee-alfayoumi-dies-rcna221239
