Julian Daggett, 72, was beaten to death at a residence in the 5000 block of West Washington Boulevard in the Austin neighborhood on Chicago's West Side on Friday, November 2, 2018. He lived at the address where he was found. The Chicago Police Department investigated his death.
Officers found Daggett unresponsive about 6 p.m. with blunt trauma injuries to his head, according to Chicago police and the Cook County medical examiner's office. He was pronounced dead at the scene. Police at first said he had been shot, but an autopsy the next day found that he died from an assault and blunt force trauma, and the medical examiner ruled his death a homicide. The Chicago Tribune reported his killing as part of a violent stretch in which at least five people were killed in homicides across the city in less than 12 hours.
Police did not release a description of anyone they wanted to question, and the public reports do not say who found him, whether anything was taken from the home,
whether there were signs of forced entry or whether he knew his attacker. No arrest was announced, no reward tied to his case could be found, and no follow-up story about the investigation appears to have been published. The Tribune included him in its list of the city's 2018 homicide victims, and the Chicago Sun-Times homicide tracker, which lists every homicide in the city, records his death as a beating.
Little about Julian Daggett's own life has been made public. No obituary or family fundraiser could be found for this account. The Daggett name has deep roots in Austin: other people named Julian Daggett appear in Chicago records, including a police officer of an earlier generation who, with his wife, was among the first Black families to move into the neighborhood in the late 1960s. The public record does not show whether the man killed in 2018 was related to that family, and he should not be confused with anyone else who shared his name. What stands out is his age. A 72-year-old man beaten inside his own home is among the most vulnerable of victims, and his death drew only a few sentences of coverage.
Washington Boulevard is a wide residential street lined with greystones, brick two-flats and apartment buildings. Austin, one of Chicago's largest community areas, stretches along the city's western edge next to suburban Oak Park. On a Friday in early November it is already dark by 6 p.m., but neighbors returning home from work, people on porches or someone who stopped by to see him that afternoon may have noticed a visitor coming or going.
Chicago recorded about 580 homicides in 2018 and about 500 in 2019. Chicago police reported clearing roughly half of the city's homicides in 2019 and the years that followed, though those figures count cases closed without charges.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Julian Daggett could be found in news archives or public records. More than 7 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who knew Julian Daggett, who visited him in the days before he died, or who saw someone at his home on West Washington Boulevard that Friday afternoon or evening may be able to help. Even a small detail, such as a name overheard, a car seen leaving the area or a conversation remembered, can help detectives move a case forward. Anyone with information can call the Chicago Police Department's anonymous tip line at (833) 408-0069 or submit a tip online at CPDTIP.com, or contact Cook County Crime Stoppers at (800) 535-STOP (7867).
