NATION : Mercy Death Father Hospitalized
CICERO, Ill. — Rudy Linares, the distraught father who disconnected his comatose son’s life-support system at gunpoint, was hospitalized early today after a drug overdose, officials said.
Cicero Police Deputy Supt. Steven Zalas said Linares, 23, told police he had taken some bad PCP “and he wanted his money back from the guy he bought it from.” Linares refused to tell police who had sold him the drug “because then he can’t buy it any more,” Zalas added.
When police asked him why he had taken the drug, Zalas said Linares responded, “What would you do if your son just died?”
The overdose comes about two weeks after a grand jury declined to indict Linares on a murder charge in the death of his 15-month-old son, Samuel. The boy had been comatose nearly nine months after a freak accident in which he inhaled part of a balloon.
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