(The following story by Kristen Cates appeared on The Southern Illinoisan website on August 6.)
CARBONDALE, Ill. — A Carbondale man is facing criminal charges after a fight with Amtrak employees early Friday morning.
Jackson County sheriff’s deputies arrested 47-year-old Thomas L. Young of Carbondale, who is accused of causing a disturbance at the Carbondale Amtrak Station just before 2 a.m.
Sheriff’s deputies reported someone at the station flagged down a deputy who was driving through Carbondale at that time, reporting an altercation in progress.
As the deputy was parking his vehicle, he reported seeing Young punch one of the Amtrak employees.
Station agent Alan Diedrich said Young was standing on the train platform and when the City of New Orleans train arrived from Chicago, he began panhandling, asking passengers for money. Diedrich said Young was intoxicated at the time.
“When asked to stop he became offensive,” Diedrich said.
According to reports from the sheriff’s department, while detaining Young, the deputy found Young had a knife in his rear pocket.
Young now faces misdemeanor charges of possessing a knife with intent to cause harm, battery with intent to cause bodily harm and a felony charge of aggravated battery to a government employee.
Diedrich said the employee involved in the incident was not injured. This sort of behavior is uncommon for the station to have to deal with, he said.
“There has been times we’ve had to remove people on the train,” Diedrich said.
Since Sept. 11 and especially with the new scare of violence in the trains of London, Diedrich said security has been tightened and there is less tolerance for unruly behavior.
Still, he said, Friday morning’s incident wasn’t a big problem.
“Whoever was there did the right thing and called the police,” Diedrich said.