Prosecutors say a burglar who got caught watching porn in an Edgewater man’s apartment broke into the victim’s downstairs neighbor’s apartment minutes later and sexually abused a woman as she took a midday nap this week. Neither victim knows the accused man.
Christopher Grammer, 29, was ordered held without bail by Judge Barbara Dawkins on charges of home invasion, criminal sexual abuse, and residential burglary.
On Tuesday afternoon, Grammer allegedly hopped the back gate of an apartment building on the 5900 block of North Magnolia and pushed in a third-floor window air conditioning unit. He climbed through the window and made himself at home by taking a nap, showering, and using the victim’s computer to watch porn, Assistant State’s Attorney Danny Hanichak said.
The 26-year-old man who lives in the apartment returned home around 3 p.m. and noticed that his air conditioner had been knocked out of the window. He thought his cat did it.
But he realized something was very wrong when he discovered water on the floor of the apartment, his bed in disarray, and, jarringly, Grammer watching porn at his desk, according to Hanichak.
Grammer apologized and left the apartment when the man confronted him.
But he didn’t go far. Instead, Hanichak said, Grammer entered the building’s second-floor unit through an unlocked rear screen door.
A 30-year-old woman who lives there was awakened from a nap by something brushing her face, Hanichak continued. She thought it was her dog. It wasn’t. It was Grammer’s penis, according to Hanichak, who said Grammer was naked.
The woman screamed and scooted Grammer out of the apartment, then called out to her boyfriend, who was on a Zoom meeting in his office with the door closed. He went after Grammer and found him trying to enter the first-floor apartment, Hanichak said. Chicago police arrested Grammer less than three hours later in the neighborhood.
Grammer admitted to entering both apartments and to touching the woman’s face with his penis because “he was trying to initiate sex,” according to Hanichak.
He has previous felony convictions in Tazewell County for aggravated battery of a peace officer, theft, and possessing a stolen motor vehicle.
Grammer’s public defender pointed out that he left both apartments when asked and said he was cooperative with investigators.
