Background: News footage of The Line bar in Momence, Ill. (WLS). Inset (left): Courtney Drysdale (Jensen Memorial Chapel and Cremation Society). Inset (right): Julius Burkes Jr. (Kankakee County Sheriff's Office).
An Illinois woman was killed while opening up the bar she owned, allegedly shot by a man who robbed her first.
The Kankakee County Sheriff's Office announced on Tuesday that it arrested 47-year-old Julius Burkes Jr. outside his home in Hammond, Indiana, the day after 30-year-old Courtney Drysdale was found dead at the bar she owned. Kankakee County Sheriff Mike Downey told Chicago-based ABC affiliate WLS that his department received numerous tips after sharing surveillance camera images of the suspect in Drysdale's slaying.
Drysdale was found shot dead on Monday morning at The Line, the bar she owned in Momence, Illinois, not far from the Illinois-Indiana border.
During a press conference on Tuesday, just hours before Burkes was arrested, Downey provided details about the case, stating that Drysdale was opening up the bar at around 11 a.m. when the suspect approached her, "brandished a firearm and demanded money from the cash register." Downey stated that even though Drysdale "complied" with those demands, "the suspect shot her twice, execution-style."
The suspect, later identified as Burkes, then fled the scene after attempting to tamper with "what he believed" was a surveillance camera, Downey said. Despite Burkes' alleged efforts, Downey said "investigators recovered video evidence."
In a Facebook post announcing the arrest, the Kankakee County Sheriff's Office said Burkes was being held in Indiana and would be extradited to Illinois to face charges.
Drysdale's friend and coworker Hailey Gershon told WLS that the bar owner left behind a fiance and a daughter in elementary school. She was a longtime bartender at The Line before becoming its owner. A Facebook page for The Line announced that the bar would remain closed until further notice "in light of tragic events."