Woman charged with beating her 79-year-old mother

chicagotribune.com


Woman charged with beating her 79-year-old mother
By Steve Schmadeke
Tribune reporter
4:25 PM CDT, October 23, 2011

A Chicago woman appeared in court today on charges she brutally beat her 79-year-old mother, leaving the elderly woman comatose, immediately after the two were in a traffic accident last month.

The two women were driving in the 8200 block of South Stony Island Avenue on Sept. 17 when their vehicle was involved in a crash about 7:22 p.m., according to Chicago police. No other official information was available Sunday on the crash, including which woman was driving.

Immediately after the accident, witnesses saw Eunice Bailey, 48, throwing what appeared to be punches at her mother, though they could not see if the blows connected, Asst. State's Atty. Sheri Bennet said.

Witnesses later saw Bailey straddling her elderly mother outside their vehicle, slamming her head into the pavement, according to a police report. Bennet said Bailey's mother suffered "severe head trauma."

Observers in the courtroom gasped – causing a sheriff's deputy to call for quiet – after Bennet told a judge that Bailey's mother was now in a "persistent vegetative state."

The elderly woman was taken to Advocate Christ Medical Center in critical condition immediately after the alleged beating, police said. She is now being treated at a Chicago-area rehabilitative hospital.

Bailey was arrested on Friday, charged with aggravated battery causing great bodily harm of a person over 60 years old. She appeared in court wearing an orange sweater, slowly shuffling away as Judge Adam D. Bourgeois, Jr. set her bail at $500,000.

sschmadeke@tribune.com

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