A Chicago man remains jailed today after prosecutors accused him of robbing a Goose Island gas station while armed with a garden hose nozzle. Now, Chicago cops are trying to determine if Trequan Sparks, 25, is also responsible for robbing a 15-year-old boy while brandishing an object earlier in the day.
Sparks, on bail for a pending charge of manufacture-delivery of crack cocaine, walked into the service station at 1234 North Halsted shortly before 6 p.m. Wednesday and started banging a yellow and black object on the counter while threatening the clerk, prosecutors said. The cashier thought the object was a Taser.
After gathering a Red Bull and a candy bar, Sparks walked out, only to be stopped by Chicago police about 30 minutes later in the 700 block of West Schiller. Officers said they recovered the nozzle, the candy bar, and the Red Bull from Sparks.
Minutes before the holdup, a woman called 911 after a man pointed something that she believed to be a gun at her car as she traveled near Division and Halsted, not far from the gas station.
And three hours before the gas station holdup, a 15-year-old boy flagged down police and reported that a man who displayed a garden hose nozzle robbed him of his orange Calvin Klein coat in the 1300 block of North Clybourn, according to a CPD report.
As of Friday, Sparks has not been charged with either of those incidents.
Judge Maryam Ahmad ordered him to pay a $4,000 bail deposit to get out of jail, but he is not eligible for immediate release because she also held him without bail for violating bond in the pending narcotics case. That charge stems from allegations that police recovered six baggies of suspected crack cocaine from Sparks after they saw him conduct a hand-to-hand drug transaction in the Gold Coast on November 12.