Man who murdered Palestinian American 6-year-old boy dies in custody, officials say
The Illinois landlord convicted for the murder of a Palestinian American 6-year-old boy died in custody, officials said.
Joseph Czuba, 73, fatally stabbed the child, Wadee Alfayoumi, over two dozen times times days after the start of the Israel-Hamas war in October 2023. Prosecutors called the killing a hate-filled attack because he and his mother, Hanaan Shaheen, were Muslim. The murder came after Czuba and Shaheen spoke about the onset of the Middle East conflict.
Shaheen and Alfayoumi, a kindergartner, rented two rooms from Czuba in Plainfield, a suburb about 40 miles outside Chicago.
In February, a jury found Czuba guilty of murder, hate crime and attempted murder charges for the attack. A state circuit court judge in May sentenced him to 53 years in prison.
Czuba died in Illinois Department of Corrections custody on July 24, Kevin Hedemark, a spokesperson for the Will County Sheriff's Office, said in an email. Hedemark referred questions − including about the cause of Czuba's death − to state officials, who didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.
In the days before the attack, Czuba told Shaheen to move out because of her family's faith.
On Oct. 14, 2023, Czuba entered the bedroom of Alfayoumi's mother, Hanaan Shaheen, and attacked her with a military-style knife, prosecutors said. While she locked herself in the bathroom waiting for help, Czuba then attacked Alfayoumi, stabbing him 26 times.
Shaheen called 911, saying Czuba was killing her baby. Will County Sheriff's deputies found Alfayoumi on a bed with multiple stab wounds to his chest and the knife protruding from his torso. Czuba also stabbed Shaheen multiple times.
Alfayoumi's grandfather previously told reporters no sentence would reconcile the loss his family will forever suffer.
'It doesn't matter what the numbers are," Mahmoud Yousef said at the time. "He took a life from us. He took a future."
Alfayoumi's murder took place a week after Hamas' attack on Oct. 7, 2023, in which 1,200 people were killed in southern Israel and 250 others were taken hostage. Israel's military offensive in Gaza has killed nearly 60,000 Palestinians since the start of the war, according to Hamas-run health resources.
In Gaza, about a quarter of the 2.1 million people in the Palestinian territory face famine-like conditions, with thousands suffering from acute malnutrition, according to the United Nations World Food Program. Deaths from starvation among children have been chronicled by the World Health Organization and doctors.
Contributing: Chris Cannon, USA TODAY; Reuters
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