Stephan Russell

The gunman who killed a Bensenville tobacco store owner has been sentenced to 55 years in prison.

Stephan Russell of Chicago was facing a minimum of 49 years in prison, but DuPage County Circuit Court Judge Daniel Guerin tacked on another six years in his June 20 sentencing because Russell had “chance after chance” to leave the scene when his trio’s calculated robbery attempt went wrong.

Russell shot and killed Hussein Saghir in a failed 2014 attempt to rob Sam’s Tobacco and Food Mart on Irving Park Road in Bensenville. Saghir was shot after he and his brother were closing up the shop Jan. 19, 2014, and Russell and an accomplice approached to commit a robbery while a getaway driver waited in the car.

“He didn’t break it off and leave when he had the chance when the owner became engaged. Instead he escalated things by grabbing and pushing Mr. Saghir to get him back in the store,” Guerin said. “He fired the gun over the victim’s head into the store. Hussein Saghir did not have to be a casualty.

“He had a chance and did not break it off and leave when it clearly became a dangerous situation. He did not break it off and leave. Instead he escalated things and shot a man in the chest.”

Russell faced a minimum of 45 years for first-degree murder and an additional four years to be served consecutively for attempted armed robbery with a gun.

DuPage prosecutors stopped short of calling for life in prison for Russell, asking for a significant number of years to be levied against the Chicago man who “wanted to live the gangster lifestyle, even taking a life to do it,” according to Assistant State’s Attorney Kristen Johnston.

Reading from the victim impact statement of Hanan Faraj, wife of the slain store owner, Johnston said that Faraj has not celebrated her birthday since 2013 as her late husband was killed on her birthday.

“It’s over four years since I last celebrated my birthday. I have nothing to celebrate,” Faraj said in the statement. “I did not ask for (Jan. 19) to be the day I was born. I view it as the day that part of me died. I am haunted by the images of his death. Those images haunt the fun moments of our history.”

She said her life has been a downward spiral ever since her husband’s death.

“I live each day in sadness,” Faraj said. “I live each day in fear.”

She said she has been unable to hold a steady job due to the depression that still fills her.

“I wake up each morning in tears,” Faraj said. “I look over to the empty side of the bed, … I smelt his cologne on the bed for years.”

The couple had just moved into a new home, but because of the loss of income from her husband’s death, she had to move in with her parents and sold her husband’s car.

“Stephan, you destroyed our life. You took my best friend and my sense of security,” Faraj said. “You have shown no remorse. You still deny that you were involved.”

Faraj asked the judge to impose the longest prison term possible so that Russell could “think about the suffering he caused.

“Stephan, you will spend years behind bars,” Faraj said. “I will spend my life mourning my husband, depressed about the murder of my husband.”

Bill Worobec, attorney for Russell, argued for his client to get the mandatory minimum of 49 years, noting that he had no criminal history and was a mentor for many in his family.

He said even with the minimum sentence imposed, Russell, 25, would be 70 years old before his sentence was done.

Worobec said Russell had three arrests for gambling when he was a teenager, but none of the cases were ever prosecuted.

“He has no criminal disposition in his background,” Worobec added.

He noted that Russell’s mom has been dealing with various types of cancer and that her son had been with her every step of the way as well as being there for his family.

“He dropped everything to take care of her and has been a paternal figure in his family,” Worobec said. “His life has value.”

Worobec presented letters from seven of Russell’s family members. All the letters have a common thread, he said: “what a role model he was to his family, what a coach and mentor he was to people in his family.”

“His goes beyond the street life the state portrayed. He has a 5-year-old daughter,” the Wheaton lawyer said.

Judge Guerin noted that a letter from Russell’s grandmother called the defendant a ‘kind, compassionate and giving young man.’”

The judge said the fact that Russell and two others members of the OTA (Off the Avenue) Gang drove from Chicago to Bensenville to commit a robbery showed it was not a random act.

“There is evidence that he knowingly planned and targeted the store for a robbery,” Guerin said.

Co-defendants Kenneth Bardlett, 24, of Bellwood, was sentenced to 22 years in prison for his role in the robbery/murder, and Treymane Davis, 27, of Chicago, who acted as the getaway driver, was sentenced to eight years in prison.