Postal Worker Shot 3 Times While Delivering Mail: Reports

ELK GROVE VILLAGE, IL — A suspect has been arrested and charged with the shooting of a postal worker in Elk Grove Village on New Year's Eve. Stephen Casazza, a 36-year-old postal worker, was making deliveries in the 200 block of Brantwood Avenue around 6 p.m. when a man walked up to the car.

While Casazza was parked in front his home, 24-year-old Cameron Ruebusch tapped on the car window and said "what's up, man?" according to the complaint. Investigators said Casazza looked at Ruebusch, saw a handgun, and drove off, according to a WLS report.

Ruebusch then began firing at Casazza, prosecutors say, according to the report. Casazza heard the gun firing, then felt a warm and wet feeling in his shoulder. He was hit three times in the torso and arm, according to reports.

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Casazza got out of the car and yelled for help. A neighbor called 911 and ran out to help him. He was taken to the hospital with critical injuries, but is now recovering.

"If these neighbors didn't call when they did, he would have bled out," Casazza's father, Stephen Sr., said. "I'd like to thank them personally."

Two hours after the shooting, one of Ruebusch's family members told police it may have been him. The shooting "sounds like something (he) would do," police quoted the family member as saying, according to a Daily Herald report.

Ruebusch was arrested Wednesday morning in Hanover Park. He was later charged with "assaulting an agent of the United States government," according to the WLS report.

A Chicago Tribune reports police as saying Ruebusch is believed to have hidden the gun in a pile of wood chips outside his mother's apartment in town, and later brought it to Busse Woods to get rid of it.

Elk Grove Village police said residents of the area should expect an increased police presence as they investigate the shooting.

Anybody with more information on the shooting is asked to call Investigator McIntyre at 847-357-4100.

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