UPDATES throughout with additional detail, formal charges

JOLIET, Ill. • An Illinois man has been charged with gouging out his uncle's eyes then pushing him down the stairs in a fight over a remote control, authorities said.

The victim, 62-year-old Melvin Clifford, managed to call 911, and a sheriff's deputy found him at the bottom of the basement stairs with his hands stretched in front of him and blood streaming from his face, saying "'Please help. I cannot see," according to a Will County Sheriff's Department report.

Clifford's eyeballs were swollen and protruding a quarter-inch from his socket, the report said.

He told police that his nephew, Exulam Holman, 32, broke the remote and pushed him to the kitchen floor. He said Holman then straddled him and "inserted his thumbs into his eyes ... and attempted to pry the eyeballs out of the sockets," before pushing him down the stairs. The report noted that Holman weighs 280 pounds, about 140 pounds more than his uncle, and is 5 inches taller.