Police on Wednesday released a sketch of a man who beat a father and husband with a baseball bat in the northwest side Portage Park neighborhood earlier this month.
The attack put Dennis Tisdale in a coma and left him with a broken skull, a broken jaw and bruised ribs.
Tisdale and his wife, Linda, were walking in the 5200 block of West Sunnyside Avenue about 2 a.m. on March 3 after a church function when a car brushed his arm.
"A young guy came out of the car and started screaming obscenities at my husband and I," Linda Tisdale recalled Wednesday afternoon. "And he came out with an aluminum bat."
She said words were exchanged and punches were thrown. When her husband tried to run, Linda Tisdale said he tripped on a curb.
"The guy stood above him and just swung the bat right at his head," she said. "My heart broke. ... We have a family to raise. Our children are young."
The attacker then got back into the vehicle, which drove east on Sunnyside, then south on Milwaukee Avenue, police said.
The attacker was described by authorities as a man between the ages of 25 and 32 years. He stood about 5 feet, 7 inches tall, had a light complexion and a shaved head. He was last seen wearing a red sweatshirt, officials said.
Ald. Timothy Cullerton (38th) said he doesn't believe the attacker was from the area but was just passing through.
There's a long road ahead for Dennis Tisdale, who was temporarily left unable to speak and partially paralyzed. But he's since come out of his coma and continues to recover, his wife of 15 years said.
"It's nothing short of a miracle," she said.
An online fundraising effort launched by the family aims to raise $15,000 to cover Tisdale's medical bills.
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