Update January 25, 2022: The victim has died (updated story here).
A 51-year-old man was seriously injured when he was pushed to the ground and struck his head on the pavement along the Clark Street bar strip in Wrigleyville early Monday, according to Chicago police and a source. Officers who reviewed surveillance video of the incident said passersby picked through the man’s pockets as he was lying unconscious in the street.
Police responded to a call of a person down and found the victim lying in the 3500 block of North Clark around 1:20 a.m., Officer Steve Rusanov said. A witness told the officers that an offender approached the victim and punched him, according to Rusanov, who added that the man was taken to Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center in serious condition.
One source familiar with the situation said the man’s condition appeared “tenuous.” According to an employee who works in a nearby business, detectives closed down Clark Street for about two hours overnight to investigate the incident.
Officers in the Town Hall (19th) Police District’s surveillance camera operations center located footage that shows an apparent fight breaking out and the victim being pushed to the ground, according to CPD radio traffic.
The offenders then ran from the scene, the camera operators said. After the man was down, other people came by, picked through his pockets, and left the area before officers arrived, the officers said.
Area Three detectives are handling the investigation.
