‘Puncher’ sentenced to 7 years in prison just one month after arrest

One of the mentally ill men recently spotlighted in the media for attacking women in public places in the city has been sentenced to prison for seven years.

Derek Rucker, known on social media as a “puncher” because of his high-profile assaults on women on sidewalks and CTA platforms, has pleaded guilty to aggravated battery and burglary related to those attacks.

His case moved unusually fast. He was arrested Oct. 9 for punching a woman in the face on the Grand Avenue Red Line platform. And he was sentenced Wednesday to seven years in state prison, minus the month and a few days that he spent in the Cook County Jail.

Rucker, 37, has pleaded guilty to:

• Striking a 62-year-old woman in her head Nov. 20, 2024, at 21 W. Illinois Ave.
• Hitting a female CTA employee in the back of her head Sept. 30 on the Loyola Red Line platform.
• Two counts of burglary connected with entering CTA trains and spitting in passengers’ faces.

Last month, the Sun-Times reported on how Rucker and another accused “puncher,” William Livingston, have cycled through mental treatment with no apparent improvement. Police said this week that Livingston faces new charges involving an unprovoked attack on two women in Lincoln Park in June.

Rucker’s mother, Tracey Davis, said her son has schizophrenia and has been hospitalized repeatedly over the years. She has described him as needing “dire help” and says he “needs to be in a mental facility.”

On Friday, she told the Sun-Times she had spoken with her son this week but “didn’t find out till afterward” that he had pleaded guilty and was going to prison.

She’s hoping he’ll get treatment in prison. She continues to pursue legal guardianship, so she can try to make sure that happens.

“I know they have mental health [treatment] in prisons. I just hope that he gets that help when he’s in there,” she said.