Sentenced to What???

This actually happened:

• A former CTA customer service agent who was charged with murder after a man he beat at a downtown Blue Line station died has been sentenced to two years of probation, after a judge found him guilty of less-serious aggravated battery charges at a bench trial, court records show.

  Emmett Richardson, who worked at the LaSalle Street Blue Line stop, was found guilty last month by Judge Carol Howard of aggravated battery of a transit passenger and aggravated battery in a public place. But Howard found him not guilty on two counts of first-degree murder. On Monday, the judge sentenced him to 24 months of probation and ordered him to complete 20 hours of community service, court records show.

And what were the extenuating circumstances that led to this unbelievable sentence?

• The charges stemmed from the death of Kevin Powell, 54, on March 25, 2023. Prosecutors said Richardson found Powell asleep on the platform around 3:17 a.m., next to a wheelchair loaded with belongings, and attacked him for more than an hour without provocation. Richardson kicked the wheelchair out from under Powell, knocking him to the ground, then kicked Powell’s property across the platform, prosecutors said.

  From there, prosecutors alleged, Richardson shoved Powell onto an escalator and followed him to the mezzanine level, where he yanked him over a railing, causing Powell to fall on his back. Richardson allegedly dragged Powell across the mezzanine floor, struck him with a cardboard drink carrier, and hauled him to the top of a staircase, first by his hood, then by his feet. There, prosecutors said, Richardson flipped Powell down the stairs feet-over-head, treating him “like so much garbage,” in the words of former Assistant State’s Attorney Lorraine Scaduto.

  Richardson left and returned to the scene multiple times, prosecutors said, stopping twice to pour water bottles on Powell. He eventually called 911 to report an “unresponsive but breathing man” at the bottom of the stairs. Powell was declared dead at the scene. After the attack, Richardson told police he had found Powell “surrounded” by drug paraphernalia and believed the man had overdosed, prosecutors said. Investigators, however, found no signs of drug use on the platform.

But since the M.E. found cocaine in the dead guy's blood work, the judge ignored everything else.

Oh, and the offender had been officially cited by the CTA for mistreatment of customers....twice.