The last time Hannah Rhanor saw Courtney Drysdale, the pair had gotten together for a birthday dinner in southwest suburban Orland Park, where they laughed, joked and hung out as normal.
Less than two weeks later, Rhanor was still trying to wrap her head around the idea of never seeing her best friend again.
Drysdale, 30, was found shot to death at The Line, a bar she owned in Momence near the Illinois/Indiana state line in Kankakee County, shortly before noon on Monday, according to the Kankakee County sheriff’s office. An Indiana man was arrested this week in connection with the fatal shooting and is being held after waiving extradition at a court appearance on Wednesday morning.
Drysdale had been preparing to open The Line, about 60 miles south of Chicago, when the gunman walked in, brandished a firearm and demanded money from the cash register, Kankakee County Sheriff Mike Downey said at a news conference Tuesday. Drysdale complied, but the gunman proceeded to shoot her twice “execution-style” before fleeing the scene, Downey said. Drysdale was pronounced dead at the scene.
About 26 hours after the shooting, Julius E. Burkes Jr., 47, was arrested at his Hammond home in connection with the slaying.
Burkes is being held at the Lake County Jail in Crown Point. At Wednesday’s hearing, Burkes waived extradition to Illinois, but Indiana officials don’t plan to release him to Illinois until a pending residential entry case is resolved. Burkes was accused of breaking into the residence of a former girlfriend, not Drysdale, on Dec. 21. His next court date in Indiana is set for Feb. 26.
Kankakee County sheriff’s office spokesperson Trent Bukowski said Burkes will not be formally charged in Kankakee County until he is back in their custody. In an email, Bukowski said they don’t know when that will be.
In a call with the Tribune on Wednesday, Rhanor, through tears, remembered her friend as loving, funny and a “beautiful person.”
Rhanor, 29, met Drysdale when she was 10 years old. They were introduced through their mutual friend Kaylee Janeway, who knew Drysdale because their parents worked at a carnival lot together. The three of them had been the best of friends ever since.
“If a person could be gold,” Rhanor said, “it was her.”
Drysdale had worked at her bar before it was hers, starting as a bartender and eventually manager before purchasing the tavern a few years ago. When she took over, she renamed the bar “The Line” as an ode to its place on the Illinois/Indiana state line, according to loved ones.
“I’m so proud of the woman she became,” Rhanor said.
Drysdale leaves behind a 12-year-old daughter and her fiancé of five years. She was set to get married over the summer.
“She just had a lot of plans to do, a lot of things that she can’t do now,” Janeway told the Tribune.
Janeway said she and Drysdale had been inseparable since meeting nearly 20 years ago. Drysdale was the “best mother,” Janeway said, and was always there for the people around her. Janeway used to tell Drysdale that “she’s who I wanted to be when I grow up.”
It was The Line that introduced Liz Brandt to Drysdale. Brandt’s dad used to love hanging out at the bar and when he passed away around six years ago, she started to go herself. Over the years, it became something special to Brandt, too. It’s where Brandt got engaged to her now husband (Drysdale helped with the proposal, Brandt noted), and it’s even where she signed her marriage certificate.
Drysdale made anyone who walked through the door feel welcome, Brandt said.
“So many people loved her,” Brandt said. “She was everyone’s girl.”
Hailey Gershon, who’s been a friend of Drysdale’s since they were kids, described Drysdale as the “most compassionate, sweetest person you can know.” Her smile lit up a room, Gershon said, and she had a talent for bringing people together and making them family.
Gershon, who worked at The Line as a bartender for about a year, called Drysdale the best boss she’d ever had. She never got mad when Gershon made mistakes and created fun memories.
Gershon fondly remembered when Drysdale held a luau at the bar and encouraged her to ride a mechanical bull. “She was like, ‘Oh, come on, come on,’” Gershon said. “I got on, and it made her laugh so hard. It was a good time.”
Outside of work, Drysdale enjoyed reading, traveling and spending time with friends. Her whole life was about her family, especially her daughter, Gershon said.
Gershon said she was shocked when she heard that her friend had been killed. She never thought something so horrific could happen to someone she knew and in Momence, a town that’s “quiet” and “everyone knows everybody.” Gershon said she’d never seen Burkes before at the bar.
“When something like that happens, it shocks the whole county,” Gershon said. “Even people that I grew up with in high school were like ‘I never expected something like that to happen out there.’ But realistically, it could happen anywhere.”
The bar announced in a Facebook post that it would be closed until further notice “in light of tragic events.”
When Burkes was arrested, Gershon said it felt like a “weight lifted off our shoulders that someone’s going to get what they deserve for doing this to someone who’s amazing.”
Deanese Williams-Harris and Christin Lazerus contributed to this report.
