One woman and two men were charged Monday with robbing a 19-year-old DePaul University student at gunpoint, nearly four days after police said the student lied to authorities about being kidnapped and driven to an abandoned home.
Officers arrested the suspects — Tarika Gilmore, an 18-year-old from East Garfield Park, Deaaron Jackson, a 27-year-old from Humboldt Park, and Lasam Davis, a 24-year-old from Fifth City — on Friday upon finding the 19-year-old’s stolen belongings inside a deserted building, according to a statement from Chicago police.
The location’s address, in the 4200 block of West Wilcox Street, was where the 19-year-old said he was brought to at gunpoint in a Jan. 8 robbery, police said. But police said Monday morning he wasn't kidnapped and brought to that West Garfield Park location, but instead went there voluntarily to meet Gilmore.
While he was there, authorities said Monday that the three robbed him of his belongings - correcting their earlier narratives that he had been kidnapped near DePaul's campus, and then that he had been robbed in Lincoln Park.
“The detectives’ investigation revealed that the DePaul student’s story about being kidnapped near the school’s Lincoln Park campus Tuesday night and driven to an abandoned house where he was robbed at gunpoint was fabricated,” CPD said in an early Monday press release.
Authorities said that around 10:15 p.m. on Friday, officers noticed a light was on in a vacant apartment in the building on Wilcox and proceeded to knock on the back door.
At that point, the three offenders ran out the apartment's front door, according to police, who said the three told officers they did not live in the apartment.
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Officers, being aware of a “robbery pattern” surrounding that address, found a stash of stolen property inside, including the 19-year-old’s items, police said.
Gilmore, Jackson and Davis were arrested and each face a felony count of armed robbery with a firearm and a misdemeanor count of criminal trespass to real property, police said. They are scheduled to appear in bond court on Monday.
Chicago police declined to provide further details on the investigation.
