CHICAGO — A 19-year-old Chicago man charged with committing a string of robberies with a 17-year-old boy on Monday evening was recently convicted of felony retail theft for a Christmas Eve raid on a South Loop cosmetics store.
Tyler Shields was charged today with two counts of armed robbery with a firearm, aggravated vehicular hijacking with a firearm, and aggravated unlawful use of a weapon. Judge William Fahy held him without bail.
Chicago police said in a media release that Shields joined the 17-year-old to rob Walgreens, 5440 North Clark, around 7 p.m. on Monday.
Cops arrested Shields and the boy as they exited the store after a 911 caller reported seeing two men wearing ski masks entering the Walgreens.
Shields and the boy are also accused of carjacking an Audi Q5 in the 6000 block of South Peoria on Monday evening. They then used the car to go on a crime spree, according to the allegations.
Officials say that after the carjacking, Shields committed robberies at Wings and Rings, 3434 South Halsted, and Morse Fresh Market, 1442 West Morse.
Shortly after the Morse holdup, the pair made their way to the Walgreens, where the spree would end.
On Christmas Eve, Shields and another man stole 51 bottles of perfume and cologne worth $6,368 from Ulta Beauty, 1107 South Delano Court, and fled in a stolen Chrysler 300, prosecutors alleged. One of the cologne bottles contained a GPS tracker chip, and Chicago cops followed it to make the arrests.
Shields pleaded guilty to felony retail theft on May 25 in exchange for a sentence of 150 days, according to court records. The sentence was satisfied by credits he earned by being on electronic monitoring since his arrest.