Senseless murders continue to affect Chicago’s black community. On May 19, Officer Thomas Wortham IV, 30, was murdered near his parents’ home on the South Side after a group of criminals attempted to rob him of his new motorcycle.
Off-duty at the time, Wortham visited his parents’ home on South King Drive to show his father his new Yamaha R1 motorcycle. As he was preparing to leave, Wortham was approached by four men who attempted to rob him and shot him in his head once he told the men that he was a police officer.
Wortham’s father, a retired Chicago police sergeant, witnessed the incident and killed one suspect while wounding another. Two others jumped into a car and sped away.
Ironically, Wortham, who was also in the military, survived two tours of duty in the war zones of Iraq only to return home and be murdered in his own community. –a.r.
