Editor’s note: We have updated this story with newly-provided details from the Chicago Police Department at 3:40 p.m. on August 20, 2021.
A group of attackers beat and tried to carjack a man after he parked in River North around midnight Friday, leaving him with a concussion and an eye that’s swollen shut. Minutes later, another driver was beaten and successfully carjacked by a group of men just a couple of blocks away.
Around 11:45 p.m. Friday, David Osorio parked his car on the 200 block of West Huron and started walking toward Franklin Street when he was confronted by a group of offenders that a CPD spokesperson said were “all described as teenagers.”
“I saw a bunch of teens on the corner and they started to approach me,” Osorio said Friday afternoon. “One of those guys punched me in the eye, and I fell to the ground. I was unconscious for a while.” Without identifying Osorio by name, a CPD spokesperson said the victim struck his head on the ground when he fell after being attacked by the group.
“Then I got into my car, and I stayed there for ten minutes, and the kids showed up again,” Osorio continued. “They tried to get into my car, but I locked it. So, they tried to break the windshield.”
Osorio said he suffered head fractures and a broken nose.
“Hopefully, my eye won’t be compromised,” he said after being discharged from Stroger Hospital.
Police classified the attack as an attempted vehicular hijacking, according to a CPD document Osorio provided to CWBChicago.
About an hour later and just a couple of blocks away, three men wearing black hoodies pulled a driver from his Buick Verano and punched him in the face on the 400 block of West Erie, according to a source.
Police are investigating both crimes.
Carjackings in Chicago are up 45% over last year’s record-setting pace. The city has had just shy of 1,000 carjackings so far this year. And the pace is picking up. Police logged 52 carjackings through the first eight days of August. That’s up from 44 during the same days last year.
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