Boystown Stabbing Victim: 'I'm Happy That I'm Alive'
CHICAGO (CBS) – The stabbing victim from last weekend's videotaped brawl in Boystown says he is grateful police have a suspect in custody.
Rubin Robinson talked with CBS 2's Suzanne Le Mignot.
"I'm happy that I'm alive," he says.
On July 3, Robinson says he was walking with two friends on Halsted when someone in a nearby group made an obscene comment. Robinson responded and found himself surrounded by 15 people.
"Once I broke away from the crowd, I remember being hit in my ear," he says. "That knocked me off balance. That's how I fell into the wall. When I got up, I realized I was stabbed."
He showed his stapled stab wounds to Le Mignot, including lacerations on his chest and a puncture to his shoulder. A wound on his back was perilously close to his spine.
"In hindsight, I shouldn't have given power to that negativity because it ended up with me being almost dead," Robinson says of the original insult.
Police have charged 24-year-old Darren Hayes of Hammond, Ind. with stabbing Robinson. Authorities say they were able to match Hayes' image from the highly publicized video of the attack with a photo found on Facebook.
A tip from the African-American community also helped give police a name.
"I'm just happy that people are still compassionate," Robinson says.
Robinson says he and other friends have always seen Lakeview as their sanctuary. He says it's his mission to make sure something positive comes out of this negative experience.
"These things need to stop. They need to stop in Boystown. They need to stop everywhere," he says.
Robinson, a third-year community psychology student at DePaul, says he's looking forward to moving on with his life. At the same time, he wants to use this experience as a teaching tool to bring awareness to issues of violence.
He says he hopes gay African-American men in Lakeview don't become targets of discrimination following the attack.
