Early Saturday morning on Chicago’s CTA Blue Line, a 37-year-old man was stabbed to death while he slept, in an attack prosecutors say was recorded by the suspect on his own phone. The victim, identified as Dominique Pollion, was targeted without warning in a random act of violence that has shaken riders and reignited concerns about safety on the city’s public transit system.
Around 2:15 a.m., on January 10, Pollion was asleep on a crowded Blue Line train heading through the Loop when 40-year-old Demetrius Thurman entered the same car holding both a knife and his cellphone, according to court records released this week. Without any interaction or provocation, prosecutors say Thurman walked up behind Pollion, began recording, and stabbed him once in the chest near his heart and again in the abdomen.
Pollion woke up screaming, tried to scramble down the aisle away from the attack, but collapsed from his wounds before the train reached the Clark/Lake station. Passengers alerted CTA security when the train pulled in, and emergency responders rushed Pollion to Northwestern Memorial Hospital where he later died from his injuries.
Prosecutors released chilling details from both CTA surveillance cameras and footage recovered from Thurman’s own phone. After stabbing Pollion, they say Thurman switched his phone into selfie mode and captured his own face right after the attack ended. When the train stopped at Clark/Lake, he reportedly filmed again from outside the train, saying, “somebody got his ass,” before slipping into the station and leaving the scene.
Chicago police identified Thurman by running still images from CTA video through a facial recognition program and issuing an alert. An officer who had encountered him days earlier recognized him, and Thurman was arrested the next day at 210 S. Canal Street, still wearing the clothes seen in the surveillance footage and carrying the phone containing the grisly recordings.
In court, prosecutors charged Thurman with first-degree murder. They also noted troubling content on his phone: photos of other passengers asleep on the train, suggesting the attack was not only random but part of a disturbing pattern of behaviour. Thurman’s public defender has raised questions about his mental health as part of his legal strategy moving forward.
The stabbing is the latest in a string of violent incidents on Chicago Transit Authority trains. Just two months ago on the same Blue Line, a woman named Bethany MaGee was doused with gasoline and set on fire by a repeat offender, suffering severe burns over much of her body. That attack drew national attention and a federal warning to the CTA to improve safety or risk losing critical funding.
Riders say they feel uneasy stepping onto trains in the wake of these events, and city leaders are under pressure to deliver meaningful improvements. The CTA has promised increased police and security presence, but for many everyday commuters the question remains: when will it feel safe again to ride without fear?
