Odai Alfayoumi struggled to find words Friday when asked how he is doing a month and a half after the death of his son, Wadee Alfayoumi, the Palestinian 6-year-old boy stabbed to death in Plainfield Township in what police call a hate crime.
“What can I say,” he told the Tribune. “I lost my everything. My life. My son. My job. Everything.”
Alfayoumi said he took off from work for 40 days to mourn and attend court cases after his son’s death.
“Nobody can wait 40 days,” he said.
He is now driving for Uber. Many passengers recognize him and tell him they are sorry for his loss. The condolences make it hard to not think about his son’s death and hard to work, he said.
“That’s why I cannot do nothing,” Alfayoumi said.
Last week, Alfayoumi filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Joseph Czuba, the man who allegedly killed his son. The father also named Czuba’s wife, Mary, and their company, Discerning Property Management, in the Nov. 21 filing, claiming the Czubas and their company are responsible for the fatal attack through intention and negligence.
Czuba, 72, allegedly attacked the boy and his mother, Hanan Shaheen, on Oct. 14, eight days after the boy celebrated his sixth birthday. Czuba, the woman’s landlord, had become deeply troubled by Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel. He stabbed Shaheen at her door before she escaped to a bathroom, according to police.
When she came out, she found her son had been stabbed 26 times, police said. The boy was pronounced dead at Ascension St. Joseph Medical Center in Joliet.
Joseph Czuba faces ongoing criminal prosecution for the fatal attack. He pleaded not guilty Oct. 30 to murder, hate crime and assault charges as Alfayoumi watched a few feet behind him in the courtroom. A judge ordered Czuba detained before trial.
[ Plainfield man pleads not guilty to hate crime and murder charges in attack on 6-year-old Muslim boy ]
Alfayoumi’s attorney, Ben Crane, said he hopes the lawsuit will provide monetary compensation to help the family recover. Alfayoumi is seeking over $50,000 and demanded a jury trial.
“There’s justice for people who do bad things, and there’s justice for the people hurt by them,” Crane said.
For Odai Alfayoumi, the lawsuit is an opportunity to ensure his family is cared for, Crane said.
“He wants to protect his family as much as he can,” the attorney said. “He wasn’t able to when this happened, and now he wants to make sure.”
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A closed LaunchGood fundraiser collecting money for the boy’s family raised $630,541.
Any money recovered from the lawsuit would help support Shaheen’s recovery and the family’s needs, Crane said. However, identifying where money can be recovered from may pose a challenge, he added.
While Joseph Czuba could be held directly liable through his assets, Alfayoumi will likely need to prove the Czubas acted negligently to win money from their homeowners insurance policy and commercial insurance, Crane said.
The lawsuit alleges Mary Czuba texted Shaheen about her husband’s “hatred of Muslims” on the day of the attack, according to a copy shared with the Tribune.
It also claims that, before the attack, Joseph Czuba told his wife Shaheen’s Palestinian friends would harm them and also said he wanted the mother and son out of the unit they rented.
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Mary Czuba knew enough to take actions that might have prevented the attack, such as calling the police or health care providers, Crane said.
“The fact that he was in this downward spiral or was harboring hateful feelings, talking about taking steps, that something was going to be happening, all of those things in my view would cause a reasonably careful person to take some steps,” he said.
The parties are expected to appear in Will County court March 11, according to court records. The Czubas are not yet represented by an attorney, and Mary Czuba has filed to divorce Joseph Czuba, court records show.
Thousands attended the boy’s funeral in October, where many mourners likened his death to the deaths of children in Gaza killed by Israeli bombs. The funeral occurred across from an Islamic day school that temporarily closed the week of the attack after receiving a threatening letter.
“This is a terrible thing,” Crane said. “This family lost a little boy. There’s nothing worse. There’s nothing worse.”
The Tribune is using spellings of the name of the victim and his family provided by Odai Alfayoumi. Some of the spellings differ from previous spellings attributed to authorities and activists working with the family.
