Former Chicago Police Officer Sentenced to Prison for Pushing Elderly Man

A former Chicago Police officer was sentenced to three years in prison Thursday for shoving an elderly man at a gas station in Oak Lawn, leaving the 89-year-old senior citizen with a broken hip.

David Barrett grew angry on Dec. 12 when a pump wouldn’t work at a Shell gas station near 105th Street and Cicero and went inside to complain while he was off duty, Cook County prosecutors said at the time.

When the victim, who was in line in front of Barrett, asked him to calm down, Barrett pushed the octogenarian in the chest, causing him to fall down.

Prosecutors said the elderly man broke his right hip and tore his right rotator cuff and needed surgery.

At time of his bond hearing, Barrett’s attorney, Stuart Goldberg, told a judge that his client had been a Chicago Police officer for 31 years and served in the Illinois National Guard for six years.

Barrett, 59, was sentenced by Judge Colleen Ann Hyland at the Bridgeview courthouse, according to court records.

He was found guilty of battering the elderly man during a trial last spring.

Barrett was most recently assigned to the First Deputy Superintendent’s Office.