Surveillance Images Show Man Lurking In Harvey Shadows, Looking For Robbery Victims
HARVEY, Ill. (CBS) -- Ghostly surveillance images show a man lurking in the shadows in the south suburbs -- looking for his next victim.
The man is targeting people as they're coming home or heading to or from work in the early morning hours. Harvey police confirmed the same guy robbed two people minutes apart on the same block, all at gunpoint, leaving his victims and neighbors shaken.
Early Thanksgiving morning, one man got quite the scare as he arrived home.
"As soon as I looked up, he was running and pointing a gun at me, telling me not to make a sound," he said.
A robber ordered the man -- who doesn't want to be identified -- to go behind a vacant house near 159th and Lathrop at gunpoint.
"He was actually pulling me by my shirt to go with him to the back. And that was after he started checking my pockets and found a phone."
A block away, Harvey police said the same gunman robbed someone else.
And just 30 minutes before that, Martin Vuelvas' wife encountered the same man.
Joanna Tejeda ran from the suspect.
"It just went slow motion at that point when I (saw) him," she said.
A neighbor's security camera captured images of the man wearing a hoodie -- only this time he was lurking right outside their house on Westbridge.
"He was just waiting there on the side, waiting, I don't know, to do something … when I (saw) him, I ran to the car," Tejeda said.
It's believed the man saw the car running from the remote starter.
"He knew that someone was warming up their car to leave out," Tejeda said.
But the robber didn't know her husband was standing at the door watching her.
"After she screamed, he ran through the path and just left out somewhere," Vuelvas said.
Running right into the path he crossed those two people -- robbing them of so much more.
"Honestly, I felt like he was going to take my life," the unnamed victim said.
Hearing this guy is linked to at least two armed robberies leaves Vuelvas grateful his wife wasn't hurt.
"It's pretty messed up people gotta go through this," Vuelvas said.
Until this man is caught, the mayor said police will beef up patrols, but it's important people stay extra vigilant -- because the individual appears desperate.
