CHICAGO — Nearly 18 months after an armed robber shot a woman behind a Logan Square grocery store, prosecutors filed charges in the case Thursday, claiming that the accused man’s DNA was found on the victim’s car.
Daryl McKinley, 20, of Chicago, was held without bail during a bond hearing before Judge Barbara Dawkins on Thursday.
Around 9:45 p.m. on December 8, 2021, a 22-year-old woman left the Dill Pickle Food Co-op, 2746 North Milwaukee, and walked to her car with some purchases.
As she entered her vehicle, an SUV blocked her in, and two men emerged from its passenger side. Prosecutors said on Thursday that McKinley opened the passenger door of the woman’s car while the other robber shot the woman in her left arm and then demanded her property.
McKinley allegedly took the woman’s groceries and a backpack, and then both men fled in the SUV.
Surveillance video recorded the crime, but Assistant State’s Attorney Sarah Dale-Schmidt said the SUV’s license plate is not readable on the footage, and neither robber is identifiable.
But a Chicago police evidence technician swabbed the woman’s passenger door, and a DNA test of the swab returned a match for McKinley, according to Dale-Schmidt. She did not reveal how investigators obtained McKinley’s DNA for comparison or explain how officials determined that he didn’t touch her car at some other time.
Police have been trying to arrest McKinley since January, Dale-Schmidt said, and a fugitive apprehension team caught up with him this week.
His background includes a juvenile adjudication last year for possessing a stolen motor vehicle.
His public defender argued against holding McKinley without bail, saying the state’s evidence falls short of the legal threshold. He pointed out that no one has identified McKinley as the robber, none of the victim’s property has been recovered, and no faces are visible on the surveillance video.
But Judge Dawkins disagreed and granted the state’s no-bail petition. McKinley is charged with armed robbery with a firearm and unlawful vehicular invasion.