Two suburban men used a ruse about construction work to get inside an elderly woman’s Bridgeport home to steal money and jewelry from right under her nose, prosecutors say. Now, one of them has been locked up to await trial, while the other is on an ankle monitor.
On January 8, prosecutors say, Sammy Mealka, 33, of Palos Heights, knocked on an 88-year-old woman’s door in the 3600 block of South Lowe and told her he was doing construction work next door and needed to access her backyard. She obliged.
Mealka made his way toward the rear of the home, taking his time, and the woman began to feel that he was deliberately stalling, prosecutors say. She was apparently right.
According to a detention filing, while Mealka kept the woman occupied, 48-year-old Stanley Ely, also of Palos Heights, snuck into the home behind them, and made his way to the bedroom, where he rummaged through the woman’s belongings and walked out with approximately $1,000 in cash, jewelry, and other items.
Prosecutors say the woman eventually told Mealka to leave, which he did after lingering a bit more. She called the police.
When officers arrived and secured the home, the woman realized what had happened. Ring doorbell footage confirmed it. The detention filing said video shows Mealka pulling up in a 2022 Chevrolet Equinox, walking inside, and moments later, Ely stepping out of the vehicle and entering the home. The footage showed that a black cover had been placed over the vehicle’s license plate, making it difficult to track.
That detail caught the attention of a Skokie police detective who leads the North Regional Major Task Force burglary team. The detective told Chicago investigators that the vehicle looked like one belonging to Mealka — a man he had already been investigating in connection with several other residential burglaries. He told CPD that Mealka had a pattern of covering his plate at gas stations before getting on the highway, and he provided investigators with a plate number registered to Mealka, according to the detention filing.
CPD’s investigators ran the plate through license plate readers and tracked it to a gas station, where surveillance footage allegedly showed Ely and Mealka placing a cover over the license plate shortly before the Bridgeport burglary.
Both men are charged with residential burglary. Judge Luciano Panici Jr. ordered Ely detained to await trial, noting his history of similar crimes. Judge Deidre Dyer declined prosecutors’ request to detain Mealka, instead releasing him on electronic monitoring.
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