A Waukegan man who pleaded guilty to using a hammer to attack an 11-year-old boy in the woods, was sentenced to 20 years, the maximum allowed under his plea agreement.
Isaac Danyus Jr., 31, had pleaded guilty but mentally ill earlier this year to charges of aggravated battery to a child in connection with the attack. He faced between six to 20 years in prison, under the terms of the plea agreement.
His 20-year term will be served at 85 percent and Danyus will receive credit for the 825 days he has spent in Lake County Jail since his arrest.
Danyus struck the young victim, a relative, twice in the back of the head with a hammer and then knocked one of the boy’s teeth out while trying to silence him in a wooded area of a Waukegan park where he had taken the boy fishing on April 14, 2013, according to police and his videotaped statement to a Waukegan detective.
A man hearing cries intervened, and when Danyus was arrested, prosecutors said a backpack he had with him contained latex gloves, a large 60-gallon, heavy-duty, black, plastic garbage bag, plastic bags containing human hair and the hammer used in the attack. Danyus admitted to police that a saw found on the ground near the boy’s tooth was also his.
Assistant State’s Attorney Jim Newman called the backpack a “murder bag” and suggested that the boy may have been killed if he had not be able to cry out and attract the passerby’s attention.
Danyus cried audibly twice in court, once as excerpts of his interview with police were played and later as he tried to read his statement to the court, in which he said “not a day goes by that I don’t think about (the victim).”
In his interview with police, Danyus eventually told Waukegan police detective Charles Schletz that he heard voices in his head sometimes, and that a voice told him “now” just before he hit the boy with the hammer.
“I don’t know why I did it. I love (the victim),” he said, crying, in the police interview. “I didn’t want to do it.”
Danyus did say that he hadn’t planned to kill the boy, but said he might have wanted to see “what it would look like” when he hit him.
Schletz also noted that Danyus told him that he was the last person to see his father, who disappeared before the attack on the boy and has never been located.
Defense attorney Keith Grant said it is believed that the last time Isaac Danyus Sr. was seen was at a funeral home making arrangements for his sister’s funeral, after Danyus Jr. said he saw him leaving his house.
Newman and Schletz said Danyus also admitted that he felt he came close to committing a similar act with a different relative prior to the attack in the park.
Newman said that because Danyus was charged with a Class X felony and could have faced up to 30 years in prison, he had already been given a break in exchange for pleading guilty and sparing the victim and family a trial. He asked Judge Mark Levitt for the maximum 20-year sentence.
Grant argued that Danyus had improved greatly since being treated in jail and being put on medication that addressed his condition. He suggested that his family, who testified and wrote letters stating their support, would help care for him and watch him and that a sentence close to the minimum would help restore him to being a useful member of society.
Grant said Danyus, who was 28 at the time of the attack, had begun hearing voices as early as 11 or 12 years old, and that medical treatment and care, not “warehousing” in prison, is what is needed “to put the voices in bed.”
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Levitt agreed with the state that Danyus had received his break with the sentencing cap. He acknowledged the guilty plea, as well as the defendant’s lack of a criminal history and good employment history, but called his planning in terms of what he brought to the park with the boy “brutal and diabolical.”
Levitt said Danyus was a person of trust to the victim and instead of caring for him, chose him as a victim.
Levitt said he felt Danyus had more “dire” plans for the victim than what occurred, and that if it hadn’t been for the man who intervened, he might have been sentencing Danyus for more serious charges.
Finally, Levitt told Danyus he felt the extended period of incarceration was needed because he couldn’t be sure that even after treatment, Danyus wouldn’t commit “heinous acts on any unwitting victim that fell into your hands.”
Twitter @jimnewton5