Police Superintendent: Chicago has hit 144 carjackings in just the first 21 days of the year
Gregory Hoyt
If these vehicular hijackings continue at this pace, Chicago could very well see itself onto amassing 2,000 carjackings by the end of 2021.
During a press conference on January 21st, Chicago Police Superintendent David Brown delivered his remarks regarding the uptick in carjackings within Chicago:
“The spike in vehicular hijackings are a regional and national issue that both urban and suburban cities are experiencing across the country. Motives include joyriding and to facilitate anonymity while committing other crimes that include robbery and shootings.”
From what Superintendent Brown says, numerous arrests have been made in these carjacking cases.
Apparently, many of the offenders happen to be working in crews consisting of two to four people – which means that when police are working these cases, they’re not necessarily just looking for the person who stole the car but other individuals like getaway drivers or various other accomplices.
Investigators during the news conference relayed that many of these crews are either working from within the suburbs or are targeting the suburbs from outside areas.
In an effort to help stifle the spike in carjackings, Superintendent Brown announced that the CPD will expand its Vehicular Hijacking Task Force and also move to collaborate with other cities throughout the region.
CPD Chief of Detectives Brendan Deenihan also stated that there will be added staffing to the detective division along with beat cops being prepared to respond to more carjacking incidents, in an effort to expedite solving these cases.
Another unique aspect to the spike in carjackings is just how young some of these alleged offenders are. An incident from January 15th allegedly involved a 12-year-old suspect who pointed a gun at a woman and stole her car.
Superintendent Brown said that there can be numerous aspects influencing this increase in carjackings, but pointed out to some of the more recent factors like the economy and the pandemic:
“I just think all of those things, along with the anxiety around what we are now in – the worst economy since the Great Recession or the Great Depression and its impact on the families; school’s being out, and its impact on some kids, not all – and I think that’s yet to be written, the whole impact of the pandemic.”
Mere hours before Superintendent Brown had held the press conference on January 21st to discuss the ongoing debacle revolving around carjackings, a 55-year-old man was carjacked by two suspects at 6:37 p.m. that evening.
During that incident, the victim was sitting at a red light along the 400 block of North Cicero Ave when a man with a metal pipe approached the driver’s side door and a second assailant approached the passenger door with a gun drawn.
The two suspects had ordered the driver out of the car, and when he complied, the suspect holding the metal pipe began to strike the victim several times before driving off in his black Acura PDX.
The victim in that case was said to have been taken to Mount Sinai Hospital, where his condition was reported as stabilized after the attack.
Three other carjackings occurred on January 21st – one of which happened at around noon in a parking lot located within the 900 block of West Weed St where a female victim was carjacked by two armed men.
Police say the suspects stole some of the woman’s personal belongings as well as the keys to her black Porsche Cayenne SUV and sped off.
At around 6:10 a.m. that day, within the 3100 block of North Kimball Ave, two armed men carjacked a 46-year-old man and a 36-year-old woman who were inside of their 2019 Toyota Corolla.
Hours before that incident, at approximately 2:00 a.m., a 26-year-old man was carjacked of his Mercedes while at a gas station near 31st St and Michigan Ave.
During that incident at the gas station, the victim was reportedly at the service window of the establishment when two suspects approached in a black vehicle and stopped near him. A male suspect got out of the passenger seat, held the victim at gunpoint and demanded his car keys and his cell phone.
We at Law Enforcement Today recently reported on how the CPD recently began offering tips on how to deal with carjackings – namely due to the sudden increase in said category of crime.
Here’s that previous report.
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CHICAGO, IL- As carjackings skyrocket throughout Chicago, police have issued tips to residents in order to tell them how to prevent being carjacked, and if that isn’t possible, how people should respond if they are victimized, NBC5 in Chicago reported.
Chicago’s finest held a press conference last week, in which they told people to maintain situational awareness while traveling around the city. Superintendent David Brown suggested traveling in pairs with someone sitting in the passenger seat whenever possible.
“One of the tips that we try to give victims is to be aware of your surroundings,” Brown said. “Try as much as possible when you are going from a store, from your car and back to your car to look around to see if you see any suspicious activity.
“If you see something suspicious, this is where you got to call 911 and say there was a suspicious car behind my car, instead of walking up and having an armed confrontation.”
Brown noted that carjackers tend to travel in pairs or fours, typically looking for individuals for an opportunity to come up. He also said offenders typically travel in cars.
He also said that the spate of carjackings has spread into Chicago suburbs, so the police department is working with regional partners in order to reduce the number of such incidents. He said that police believe the offenders live in the city, travel to the suburbs and then return back to town.
The superintendent announced a series of steps being undertaken by the Chicago PD in order to address the recent spike in the crime. He said that the rate of such incidents doubled in 2020 year over year from 2019 and said so far in 2021 there have been 144 reported carjackings.
The department has committed to adding more detectives to finding the individuals responsible, said Brown, along with Chief of Detectives Brendan Deenihan, promising to bring them to Cook County’s state’s attorney’s office for prosecution.
It is unknown if Cook County’s DA, Kim Foxx will actually prosecute the crimes since she is among a number of far-left DA’s who refuse to prosecute so-called “victimless” crime.
Brown said the average age of carjacking offenders is individuals between the ages of 15 and 20, while noting that one offender was only 12-years-old. Brown also asked for others who work with the city’s younger population to help with the effort to combat the issue, saying that it takes more than just police to handle the issue.
“Law enforcement cannot do this alone. We need everyone—teachers, mentors, coaches, parents, the faith community and others—to help us,” the superintendent said.
Deenihan added that the Chicago PD has added additional resources in 2021 which will allow for a carjacking-specific team within each detective division on a citywide basis. He noted that the department needs to work directly in the neighborhoods in order to solve the issue.
“We need to work directly with the young people to provide opportunities and dissuade them from contributing to this problem,” Deenihan continued.
Ironically just hours after the news conference, an additional four carjackings were reported to police. Officials said that three people in their 50’s were victimized in separate incidents, including one who was beaten with a pipe.
In the latter incident, a man was stopped at a red light when he was approached by two armed carjackers at around 6:35 p.m. They were armed, one with a gun and the other with a short pipe, and ordered the driver out of the vehicle, an Acura MDX. Even though he was compliant, the man with the pipe hit the victim several times, then left in his car. The man was taken to a local hospital for treatment.
Just under a couple of hours later, another victim, this time a 51-year-old woman was carjacked at gunpoint. She told police she was sitting in her BMW at around 8:10 p.m. when a car pulled up alongside. Two males got out of the car, with one pointing a gun at the woman. They demanded she get out of her car and to leave her purse and cellphone. She complied and was not injured. Both males fled in her car.
Less than an our later, yet another victim, this time a 53-year-old ride share driver was accosted at gunpoint by two males, who took his Infiniti Qx60 at gunpoint, driving off in his car and leaving the Audi they drove to the scene behind.
Finally at around 10:30 p.m., another female was carjacked at gunpoint while filling her car up with gas. The 19-year-old was approached by two males who displayed a gun. These two were not into luxury vehicles and took her 14-year-old Pontiac G6.
The carjackings seem to primarily involve the taking of “luxury” vehicles. While NBC Chicago didn’t provide the full descriptions of those involved, a report on CWB Chicago identified the suspects in three carjackings last Saturday as involving two black males aged 18-30-years-old. They described one as between 5’4” to 5’6” and weighing 130 to 150 pounds. The other is 5’7” to 6-feet-tall and weighs between 140-160 pounds they said.
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