Third person charged with shoving man to his death from CTA Red Line train

A third person stood charged Wednesday in an incident in which a man was shoved off a Chicago Transit Authority Red Line train and killed.

Christian McBounds, 18, was charged with first-degree murder, felony murder, aggravated battery to a transit employee or passenger, and mob action — all felonies. He was ordered detained at a hearing in Cook County Criminal Court on Wednesday.

Authorities allege McBounds is one of four people who shoved 29-year-old Kyle Bickham off a Red Line train heading north near the 69th Street station along the Dan Ryan Expressway on Labor Day.

Also charged are a young woman — Katlar Parchman, 19 — and a 15-year-old girl. Police as of Wednesday were still looking for a second man.

In a proffer Wednesday, prosecutors said McBounds, Parchman, the 15-year-old girl, and the man still at large, all got on the Red Line at the 95th Street terminal after exiting a bus. McBounds and Parchman used their Ventra cards to get through the turnstile, while the 15-year-old girl and the man at large passed the turnstiles without paying, prosecutors said.

All four sat down in one car on a Red Line train, prosecutors said. Bickham sat down across from Parchman and began talking with her, prosecutors said.

Bickham eventually stood up and began walking around the train car, prosecutors said. He approached a man and said something unintelligible while looking at the man's bag, and the man told Bickham to get away from his bag, prosecutors said.

In a detention hearing for Parchman this past weekend, the defense said Bickham was touching passengers' purses, appeared intoxicated, and smelled of alcohol.

At one stop, Bickham got off the train and got back on, and then he sat back down, prosecutors said. A couple of minutes afterward, Bickham got into a quarrel with the 15-year-old girl, and he spat on her, striking Parchman with his spit as well, prosecutors said Wednesday.

The quarrel continued as Bickham and the girl moved around the train car, until the man still at large grabbed Bickham by the arm while the teenage girl punched him in the face, prosecutors said.

All four defendants then surrounded Bickham, and they began to punch him, prosecutors said. They moved toward the end of the train car, and McBounds began to choke Bickham while the others went on punching him and pulling on his head, prosecutors said.

There was a short break during the fight where everyone moved toward the sliding train car doors as Bickham and the teenage girl kept yelling, prosecutors said. Bickham reached down to grab his headphones from the floor, and McBounds and the man at large forced him to the corner near the exit doors as the teen girl and Parchman gathered around Bickham, prosecutors said.

All four defendants again surrounded Bickham, and the teenage girl stepped up next to the man still at large, and they pushed Bickham out of the moving train, prosecutors said. Bickham resisted, and the teen girl grabbed him by the shoulder and heaved him out of the train as McBounds and Parchman stood directly next to them, prosecutors said.

When Bickham was shoved out of the moving train, he was hit by another train traveling south and killed, prosecutors said.

Witnesses said the teen girl say "he shouldn't have bothered us," before exiting with the man still at large at a later stop, prosecutors said.

All the suspects now charged were identified through surveillance video, and McBounds and Parchman were also identified through the Ventra cards they used to get on the 'L' system, prosecutors said.

Investigators also reached out to the college McBounds attends, and found out he quit going to classes on the date Bickham was killed, prosecutors said. An arrest warrant was issued for McBounds.

McBounds was arrested on Monday at his home in Chicago's Morgan Park neighborhood. Prosecutors said he does not have a criminal record.