CHICAGO — A Chicago man who stabbed his girlfriend until she lost consciousness was shocked when she woke up several hours later, prosecutors said.
“I thought you were dead,” Mark Williams allegedly told the woman before saying that he had been trying to figure out how to hide her body, officials said.
Judge Ankur Srivastava held Williams without bail during a bond hearing Monday afternoon.
Williams, 28, and the 23-year-old woman argued Thursday night at the woman’s Pullman apartment, Assistant State’s Attorney Sarah Dale-Schmidt told Srivastava.
Ultimately, Williams hit the woman with the back of his hand, then stabbed her with a steak knife from the kitchen until she lost consciousness, Dale-Schmidt alleged.
The woman woke up Friday morning with Williams asleep next to her. She was unable to move due to her injuries and severe pain, said Dale-Schmidt.
When Williams woke up, he told her he thought she had died and needed to hide her body so he wouldn’t go to jail, Dale-Schmidt continued. She said the woman asked Williams to get help, but he refused and instead poured alcohol on her wounds, causing severe pain.
The victim woke up again Friday afternoon and called a witness, explaining what happened and saying she could not move and would be unable to let paramedics into the house.
A relative eventually gained access to the woman’s apartment with the help of a security guard and called 911. The guard took the couple’s 4-year-old daughter out of the house until authorities arrived, Dale-Schmidt said.
Chicago police found Williams asleep in the apartment and took him into custody.
Dale-Shmidt detailed 11 stab wounds and lacerations that the woman suffered. She said the woman underwent emergency surgery for a collapsed lung and internal bleeding, then had another surgery to repair her right elbow joint. The woman remains in intensive care and is expected to be hospitalized for several more days.
Williams has an active arrest warrant for domestic battery involving strangulation in Nevada, Dale-Schmidt said. He was convicted of misdemeanor domestic battery there in 2019 and has felony convictions in Illinois for residential burglary and retail theft, according to Dale-Schmidt.
He’s charged with attempted first-degree murder and aggravated domestic battery.