Police Spend Overnight Hours Chasing Car Burglars

PALOS HEIGHTS/PALOS PARK, IL -- Palos Heights and Palos Hills police spent the early morning hours chasing car burglars around their respective towns on Tuesday. It’s just one more chapter to add to a summer epidemic of burglaries and thefts of vehicles by residents who continue to leave their cars unlocked. Police are imploring residents to lock their cars -- even in the garage -- and take their keys, garage openers and other valuables with them into their homes and businesses.

Five cars were hit in the Ishnala subdivision early Tuesday, including a vehicle that was stolen. The vehicle apparently fled through Palos Park, Crestwood and was last seen in Robbins, said Deputy Chief Bill Czajkowski, of the Palos Heights Police Department.

Illinois’s strict police pursuit statutes allow law enforcement to only chase fleeing vehicles when the occupants have committed or attempted a forcible felony by threatening or inflicting bodily harm, when someone is escaping by use of a gun or other deadly weapon, or else poses a danger to the community unless apprehended immediately,. Because the vehicles were unlocked when they were burglarized or stolen, the crimes were not considered forcible and did not meet the pursuit threshold. (SUBSCRIBE: Get Real-Time Alerts and a Daily Newsletter for Palos.)

“Police have restrictive pursuit policies,” Czajkowski said. “We’re not going to put the public in danger for a cup of change and these guys know it.”

The alleged crooks also removed two garage openers from older vehicles that don’t have linking systems to the garage door. In both instances, the burglars entered the garage but Czajkowski said it’s unknown if anything was stolen.

Around 6 a.m. Tuesday, a Palos Park officer encountered car burglars near Old Creek and Wolf Roads. Chief Joe Miller said the officer engaged the two suspect vehicles, including one that had just been reported stolen. The car burglars drove around the Palos Park patrol car and fled southbound down Wolf Road, at some points driving southbound in the northbound lanes of Wolf Road. Officers terminated the pursuit for safety concerns. The fled from Orland Park police on 143rd Street, heading east on 143rd Street where the vehicle was tracked going through Crestwood.

Miller said officers found numerous car doors open west of 104th Street to Will Cook Road. The vehicles had apparently been rifled through. Police have recently taken to social media to raise awareness of the epidemic, including the #9pmroutine where residents are reminded via social media to go get their valuables out of the car and lock their vehicles every evening a 9 o'clock.

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