A Chicago man was sentenced Tuesday to 18 years in prison after pleading guilty to trying to kill a fellow halfway house resident because the victim was gay, Cook County prosecutors say. Judge Barbara Dawkins sentenced Timothy House, 33, to 18 years after he pleaded guilty to attempted first-degree murder. She handed him a concurrent 3-year term on a hate crime count.
The attack occurred on December 22, 2025, at a halfway house in the 10400 block of South Wabash Avenue, about a month after House was paroled from prison, where he had served time for criminal sexual assault and aggravated domestic battery convictions. According to prosecutors, the 55-year-old victim lived across the hall from House, and the two had spoken regularly, including about religion, and the victim had told House he was gay.
Shortly before 10 p.m., House entered the victim’s room and asked to use his phone. When the victim refused, House left briefly, stopped in the hallway to grab a knife from a kitchen area, then returned to the room and began stabbing and beating the man in the head and body with the knife and his fists. Prosecutors say the knife blade broke off during the assault and House picked it up and continued to use it against the victim.
When a witness entered the room, House ended the attack, hugged the witness, told him he loved him, then went downstairs, retrieved his prayer mat, and left. Both the victim and the witness called 911. Officers found House a few blocks away, his clothes still bloody, prosecutors say. The victim suffered two stab wounds to the head, a wound to the neck, and a laceration to the shoulder but survived.
When officers asked House what happened, he allegedly said he had committed “a terrorist attack” and asked whether there was “a lot of blood over there.” After being read his Miranda rights, House asked whether the victim was dead, admitting to stabbing him in the head, and saying he attacked him because the victim was homosexual and “not a Christian,” prosecutors said. House also allegedly told police he had been trying to chop the victim’s head off and was “not sorry.”
“This defendant targeted another person because of who he was and attempted to take his life,” Cook County State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke said in a statement on Thursday. “Hate-fueled motivated violence causes lasting harm to victims and communities alike.”
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