At least a dozen people used six stolen cars to coordinate a smash-and-grab burglary of a luxury fashion store on the Magnificent Mile that resulted in a getaway driver striking and killing a Skokie man on his way to work, prosecutors said Saturday.
Seven suspects were arrested and charged with murder, burglary and retail theft. Four of them appeared in court Saturday and were ordered held in custody while awaiting trial.
About 5 a.m. Thursday, the group crashed a pickup truck into the Louis Vuitton store, 919 N. Michigan Ave., took nearly $700,000 worth of merchandise from inside and then fled in multiple cars, Chicago police and Cook County prosecutors said.
Mark Arceta, 40, was driving his Honda CRV east on Ohio Street when the driver of a Kia Stinger fleeing the burglary south on Michigan Avenue at 77 mph, slammed into his car, prosecutors said.
Arceta, who was traveling through a green light and was on his way to his last shift before going on paternity leave, was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where he was pronounced dead, prosecutors and police said.
His wife gave birth to their second child a day later, prosecutors said.
Arceta was described as “a kind, generous, compassionate man, a family member and a friend to many,” according to a fundraiser that was created to support his family, which has reached more than $21,000.
“In the face of sudden loss, lives were shattered and hearts were broken, without a chance to offer a final goodbye. Their family has suffered an immense loss and one can only imagine how daunting the world feels at present,” the fundraiser reads.
Dejuan Wingard, 30, was allegedly driving the Kia and was taken into custody, officials said. He remained hospitalized Saturday, along with two other suspects — Darius Bowdry, 30, and Kellen McMiller, 35 — for injuries that were not considered to be life-threatening, prosecutors said. They will appear in court once they’re released from the hospital.
Several other suspects fled in an Infiniti Q50 that lost control while traveling south on DuSable Lake Shore Drive near Millennium Park. Two of the four people in the car were arrested, police said.
At least two others remain at-large, prosecutors said.
The four other men charged in the incident, who appeared in court Saturday, are: Harvey Fisher, 26; Alton Jackson, 37; Anthony Hemphill, 22; and Keith Perkins, 19.
All seven suspects are charged with felony counts of first-degree murder, burglary and theft. Wingard also faces a reckless homicide charge.
About $270,000 worth of the stolen merchandise has been recovered, prosecutors said.
“This case is a heartbreaking example of the threat that these organized retail theft operations pose to the entire community. Not only is the economic vitality of our city compromised by these crimes, but these offenders pose a physical danger to every one of us who live and work here,” Cook County State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke said in a statement.
“We will not tolerate it, and we will continue to seek detention and use all of our prosecutorial tools to bring accountability and appropriate charges to those who commit these brazen attacks.”