A Niles man has been sentenced to seven years in prison after pleading guilty to two counts of hate crime for defacing signs, a park bench and other property on the Northwestern University campus in Evanston with swastikas and other Nazi symbols earlier this year, officials said.
The relatively stiff sentence reflects Shahid Hussain’s history, which includes a conviction for a series of antisemitic hate crimes on Chicago’s North Side in 2022.
In the latest case, prosecutors said surveillance video shows Hussain entering the Northwestern campus on January 30 and drawing swastikas and other Nazi symbols on numerous signs and other university property. The video also shows him raising his arm in a Nazi salute.
Northwestern University police officers identified Hussain from the surveillance footage based on previous incidents at the university. Evanston and Northwestern police located and arrested him about two weeks later, prosecutors said. Hussain admitted to defacing the property with Nazi symbols, according to prosecutors.
Cook County Judge Paul Pavlus sentenced Hussain on Thursday. Under Illinois’ good-behavior provisions, the sentence will be reduced by 50%.
“Acts of hate and intimidation have no place in our communities,” State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke said. “This guilty plea and prison sentence demonstrate that we will hold individuals accountable for crimes intended to intimidate and spread hate in our communities.”
CWBChicago previously reported on Hussain’s last hate crime conviction, which stemmed from a series of antisemitic vandalism incidents involving a synagogue and Jewish school on the North Side. In one incident, Hussain stood outside Yeshivas Meor Hatorah of Chicago, 3635 West Devon Avenue, and yelled about Jews while breaking lights, using his hands to gesture as though he were shooting a shotgun and making a Nazi-like salute, prosecutors said. Video showed Hussain breaking other lights in the area while wearing a red hat and cape, two items he allegedly wore during other incidents.
Hussain allegedly admitted on Facebook that he was responsible for the incidents and posted photographs of himself performing a Nazi salute while wearing a mustache similar to Adolf Hitler.
In another incident, a witness saw Hussain yelling loudly about what time Shabbat began as he walked outside Congregation KINS of West Rogers Park, 2800 West North Shore Avenue, prosecutors said. She recorded video of a man wearing a cape and red hat as he walked into a vestibule, where another camera captured him breaking the glass.
Later, a driver called 911 after allegedly seeing Hussain paint swastikas on trailers outside Jewish institutions on the 2900 block of West Devon Avenue. Those incidents were also captured on video.
Police arrested Hussain near the 6300 block of North Albany Avenue after a 911 caller reported seeing a man yelling about bombing and burning synagogues, according to CPD records.
Hussain was on parole for forgery and under supervision for stalking and violating a no-contact order when the 2022 hate crimes occurred. He pleaded guilty in January 2023 to five counts of hate crime involving a synagogue and two counts of institutional vandalism. He received a three-year sentence on each count, to be served concurrently, with the sentences reduced by 50% under the state’s good-behavior provisions.
