CHICAGO — The driver of a stolen SUV sped away from cops, then bailed out and hid on an expressway bridge pillar, leaving five guns, $19,000 in cash, and $25,000 worth of pot in his car, prosecutors said Friday.
Judge Susana Ortiz ordered Bahroze Hussain, 31, to pay a $25,000 bail deposit to be released on electronic monitoring.
Cops saw a Jeep Grand Cherokee driving recklessly near 43rd and MLK Drive around 7 p.m. Wednesday and tried to pull it over. The driver fled from officers, but a police helicopter kept an eye on the vehicle as it headed up the Dan Ryan Expressway and then onto the Kennedy Expressway, officials said.
Ground units blocked off part of the road near Jackson, and the driver tried to escape, crashing into five other cars and driving the wrong way on the expressway until he bailed out near 14th Street.
Police searched the area for 45 minutes after the driver hopped a wall. They eventually found Hussain on top of a pillar under an expressway ramp at 16th and Ruble, prosecutors told the judge.
Cops called in the fire department to remove Hussain from the pillar.
Back at the Jeep, investigators determined that it had been stolen from Schaumburg in March and bore the wrong license plates, prosecutors said.
Inside the SUV, cops allegedly found a trove of interesting materials: $19,061 in currency, more than eight pounds of pot, two or three grams of suspected cocaine, and five guns. They also found four license plates, one of which was supposed to be on the Jeep.
Prosecutors told the judge a loaded gun was found on the passenger floorboard and another on the passenger seat. In the trunk, a duffel bag allegedly contained a rifle and two handguns, all of which were unloaded.
Hussain is charged with five counts of unlawful use of a weapon by a felon, manufacture-delivery of cannabis, two counts of possessing a controlled substance, aggravated possession of a stolen motor vehicle, and misdemeanor reckless driving and leaving the scene.
He was convicted of two felonies in 2014: driving on a revoked or suspended license and theft, which was initially charged as armed robbery, according to prosecutors.
In 2012, The Patch reported that police pursued a car through Evanston and Skokie after two men stole a 99-cent bottle of Lipton Iced Tea from a gas station because the clerk didn’t have change for a $20 bill. Hussain was allegedly the passenger in that caper.