A shoplifting team that has repeatedly targeted the Macy’s store at Water Tower Place raised the stakes by bringing baseball bats to ward off security officers during a raid on the retailer’s menswear department last week, prosecutors said. One adult and one juvenile are now charged with robbery.
Loss prevention officers caught 19-year-old Darien Green shoplifting three times in the previous month, according to prosecutors. But Macy’s didn’t press charges in those cases.
So, when Green and two companions entered the store with baseball bats on the afternoon of November 12, security officers decided to keep an eye on them, said Assistant State’s Attorney Meredith Rudolfi.
When a guard approached the trio in the menswear department, Green threatened him with a bat while a juvenile threatened to beat the agent if he didn’t stop following the group around. The security officer backed away while other Macy’s employees kept an eye on the crew via surveillance cameras.
Green and the third offender allegedly took coats from the racks and walked out. Macy’s agents did not try to apprehend the group.
Two days later, Green and the juvenile returned to Macy’s. Loss prevention officers called police, and cops took the two into custody.
Green was wearing the same burgundy pants that he wore during the baseball bat incident — along with a jacket that is “visually identical” to the one he stole, Rudolfi said.
During an interview with police, Green admitted to being in the store with a baseball bat on November 12, and he said the juvenile made threats while wielding another bat, according to Rudolfi. Green also admitted that his coat is “expensive” and eventually conceded that he stole it from Macy’s, she continued.
According to CPD records, Green has been arrested six times in the past eleven months: for criminal trespass to vehicles and trespassing in Englewood; for shoplifting in Uptown; for battery at the Sheridan Red Line station; and for failure to disperse from Trump Tower during riots on May 31. Only the battery charge remains pending, Rudolfi said.
On Sunday, prosecutors charged him with robbery in the Macy’s case and held him on an arrest warrant for another retail theft case. Judge Arthur Willis set Green’s bail at $20,000 and ordered him to go onto electronic monitoring if he can post the required $2,000 deposit bond.
The juvenile was also charged with the Macy’s robbery, but no further information is available due to his age. The third offender remains at large.
