CHICAGO — An 83-year-old man is in critical condition after a driver sped onto a sidewalk while escaping from a traffic stop. Chicago police tracked down the vehicle, and its two occupants are facing felony charges, prosecutors said.
It started when a concealed carry holder reported his Dodge Durango stolen and advised police that his firearm was in the vehicle’s center console, Assistant State’s Attorney Sarah Dale-Schmidt said during a bail hearing for the two men on Thursday.
Around 6:11 p.m. Wednesday, Chicago police officers spotted the Durango in the 3900 block of West 26th Street in Little Village and tried to pull it over. But the driver sped away, headed onto a sidewalk, and struck the 83-year-old pedestrian, according to Dale-Schmidt.
The officers stopped to assist the badly injured man, but the Durango continued heading west. Dale-Schmidt said the victim was in critical condition with a brain bleed.
Meanwhile, other officers discovered an unoccupied Durango in the 2600 block of South Pulaski. According to Dale-Schmidt, witnesses reported seeing two men run the vehicle, each with a firearm tucked into their waist. Two guns were found nearby, one inside a dumpster and the other behind it.
Two men matching the descriptions of the Durango’s occupants, Calvin Williams, 37, and Kyle Williams, 18, were located nearby, Dale-Schmidt alleged. She said the officers who initially tried to pull the Durango over identified Calvin Williams as the person who was driving the vehicle when it struck the pedestrian.
Calvin Williams, convicted five times of narcotics-related felonies, has a pending manufacture-delivery of fentanyl case pending in DuPage County, according to Dale-Schmidt. His private defense attorney, Tod Urban, argued that the police identification of Calvin Williams as the driver was “tenuous.”
Prosecutors charged Calvin Williams with aggravated fleeing causing bodily injury, aggravated unlawful use of a weapon, unlawful use of a weapon by a felon, and possessing a stolen motor vehicle.
Kyle Williams, a high school student, is accused of aggravated fleeing resulting in bodily harm, aggravated unlawful use of a weapon, and criminal trespass to a vehicle. He has never been arrested as an adult, according to Dale-Schmidt, but he does have a pending case in juvenile court for unlawful use of a weapon.
Judge Maryam Ahmad held Calvin Williams without bail and ordered Kyle Williams to pay a $1,000 bail deposit to go home on electronic monitoring.