Police are investigating a string of attacks and robberies that unfolded in the Loop on Tuesday evening. At least two victims who were assaulted on the CTA’s L system were taken to hospitals.
First, a 26-year-old woman was carjacked by two offenders who confronted her with guns on the 100 block of North Dearborn around 9:56 p.m. The woman was walking to her car inside a parking garage across from the Goodman Theatre when the hijackers demanded her keys at gunpoint. They drove away with her white Honda, according to a CPD report. Police said the woman was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital for an evaluation, but she did not suffer physical injuries.
Police tracked the car to Hammond, Indiana, where it crashed around about an hour after the crime. Indiana authorities arrested two occupants of the vehicle, according to witnesses.
Within 15 minutes of the carjacking, a string of violent incidents involving a group of about five teenagers began to unfold on nearby CTA trains and platforms.
Around 10:15 p.m., a CTA employee reported that five teenagers were trying to force them from their kiosk after the group robbed a passenger on the Green Line at 200 North State. The crew, including one who wore a red and black Bulls jacket, fled the scene.
Minutes later, police responded to a robbery victim injured at the Clinton Green Line station. They told police that a group of teens attacked them on a train that left State-Lake moments earlier, according to preliminary information. One of the suspects displayed a knife and took the victim’s book bag, officers at the scene said. EMS took the victim to Northwestern. A CPD spokesperson said the formal police report that documents the robbery had not been finalized this morning.
Officers at the Clinton station said the group consisted of five Black male teenagers, three of whom had shoulder-length hair. One of the suspects wore a black and Red Bulls jacket, while the one who displayed a knife wore a gray sweatshirt with black pants.
Then, a 43-year-old man was punched in the face by a group of attackers at the Lake Red Line station around 11:22 p.m., according to CPD. The offenders did not rob the victim. EMS took the man to Northwestern in good condition with bruising and swelling of his face, police said.
Officers reported seeing four teenagers, two of whom were armed with “sticks” leaving the station shortly after the attack. But witnesses could not identify the group as the attackers, and CPD could not rewind the CTA surveillance cameras to see if they were involved, according to police radio transmissions. Cops said they collected the group’s information and let them go.
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