Chicago is seeing a carjacking crisis and the latest suspect arrested was an 11-year-old boy who allegedly aided in the beating of a 59-year-old white man.
Chicago police said that the boy and a 19-year-old man walked up to the victim on Saturday and punched him in the face so forcefully that his orbital bone was fractured.
The man was placing something in the trunk of his car when he was beaten in the Buena Park neighborhood.
Police said they were able to locate the stolen car through the use of a license plate reader two hours later. When police gave chase, the car crashed into a metal fence. The man and the 11-year-old were eventually arrested.
Police have noted a rise in carjacking incidents where juveniles as young as 10 years old have been recruited into the crime by older suspects. They would not say whether this was one of those cases.
“I don’t have any specific information as to whether that 11-year-old was recruited,” said Brendan Deenihan, the Chicago Police Chief of Detectives.
“He’s with a 19-year-old. I’m not going to talk about his cognitive behavior, but he was with a 19-year-old when it happened,” added Deenihan.
A Cook County judge denied the bail of the older suspect and chastised him for not fulfilling his responsibility to help the younger man stay on the straight and narrow path.
“The example you set on that date was not one of good,” the judge said. “It was one of malice.”
WBBM-TV investigators said that carjackings — 543 — had doubled in 2021 compared to the same period from 2020. Also, the station reported that in 2020, there were nine reports of an adult being arrested with a juvenile for carjacking. So far in 2021 there have been at least five.
Here’s a local news report about the incident:
11-Year-Old Charged In Beating, Carjacking Is Part Of Trend Of Children Carjacking With Adults
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