A driver was pushed to the ground by a carjacker who took his SUV in Lakeview on Sunday afternoon, according to a Chicago police report.
The 26-year-old driver said he was pushed from behind while getting out of his running Honda CR-V on the 500 block of West Belmont, according to a CPD spokesperson. He fell to the ground, and the offender drove away with the car, the man said.
The victim ran after the car, which headed east on Belmont, then south on Pine Grove, before he lost track of it. Police met with the victim on the 3100 block of North Broadway shortly after 3 p.m. to take his report.
According to the spokesperson, the suspect is a man between 21 and 26-years-old with dark, curly hair. He stands 5’9″ to 5’11” tall and weighs 160 to 180 pounds. Area Three detectives are investigating.
Robberies, a broad crime category that includes carjackings, are down sharply in the CPD’s Lakeview-based Town Hall (19th) District this year.
Through February 6, the district recorded 16 robberies, down from 33 during the same time last year, according to the city’s crime data. Town Hall officers patrol the area bounded by Fullerton and Lawrence avenues, the Chicago River, and Lake Michigan.
On Saturday, a robber knocked a woman to the ground during an attempted mugging outside her apartment building about a half-mile north of the carjacking incident, but he wound up losing money in the crime, according to police.
The 22-year-old victim was entering an apartment building courtyard on the 500 block of West Addison when the man approached her from behind and demanded her property, the report said. At one point, the man claimed to have a knife as the woman was on the ground, but a police spokesperson said he did not get anything from the victim.
However, he did manage to drop his cellphone at the crime scene, the spokesperson added.