Woman smoking weed outside FP Middle School
Police arrived at Forest Park Middle School, 925 Beloit Ave., about 1:45 p.m. on Dec. 19, on a call that a woman was smoking marijuana outside of the school.
Officers approached the 20-year-old from Berwyn, and she gave them the blunt, saying, “I’m sorry.” She told police she was smoking to relax while waiting for a friend.
Police searched the woman’s backpack and found several “apple” zip-lock baggies, which the officer “recognized through his experience and training, said ‘apple’ baggies as packaging for the distribution/delivery of cannabis,” according to the report. They also found 122 grams of cannabis and a digital scale.
She received a felony charge for possession of cannabis.
Man shot in hand
A man said he was shot in the hand at the intersection of Desplaines and Madison at 4:44 a.m. on Dec. 18.
At first, the Maywood man told police he was standing at the intersection waiting for a bus when the incident occurred and that his co-worker drove him to Elmhurst Hospital. Then he told police he was waiting for his fiancé, eating a burger and fries, when a black sedan pulled up, yelled out the window and shot him. He said he walked to Madison and 1st Avenue in Maywood, where a good Samaritan picked him up and drove him to the hospital. Finally, he told police he was walking with a group of people about 3 a.m., when a man standing across the street shot at the group, striking the Maywood man in his left hand. The man said he fell to the ground, the group ran away and a good Samaritan picked him up and drove him to the hospital.
The bullet entered the man’s palm and exited his wrist. When asked if he knew the shooter, the Maywood man told police “he would take care of it.” The man did not wish to sign complaints and said it “was not a matter for police.”
‘iPhone Technician’ scammer
On Nov. 22, someone claiming to be an engineer for Microsoft called a 76-year-old resident of the 1000 block of Beloit, offering to service his computer. The caller told the man he needed his American Express credit card number to pay for the service. The man provided the number and his card was charged; American Express cancelled the transaction.
On Dec. 14, the man received another call from a scammer claiming to be an iPhone technician. The caller said the man’s iPhone had been hacked, that he needed to fix it. The man purchased $5,400 worth of gift cards and provided the caller with the card number for each gift card. Each card has been redeemed.
His wife and daughter found out what happened and told him that he was being scammed.
Because all the cards have been redeemed, American Express would not cancel the transactions. On Dec. 15, the scammer called the man several times again, trying to get him to purchase more gift cards.
Loan scam hits village
A 19-year-old woman came into the Forest Park Police Department on Dec.12, saying she was the victim of a fraud. She told police she had been looking into personal loans on the internet and a man called her, saying he could offer her a $9,000 loan, an amount higher than other lenders. The caller told her she needed to go to Walmart and purchase $980 in gift cards as a guarantee on her loan.
She provided the man her TCF bank account and routing numbers, claiming he would deposit the money directly into her account. She then saw that about $3,500 had been deposited in her account, and she took out $1,000. Later, she noticed her account had been overdrawn; the deposits had been rejected because they were fraudulent checks.
She called the scammer back, who told her “they” could not do business with her anymore since she had taken the money out of her account prematurely. The victim “accused of not following instructions was most likely due to her pulling money out of the fraudulently deposited checks before the offenders could withdraw the entire amount,” according to the report.
Four cars broken into
Between 8 p.m. on Dec. 14 and 12 p.m. on Dec. 15, someone broke into a Mercedes Benz parked on the 1500 block of Harlem and took two purses containing a iPhone 5 and MacBook computer.
Sometime between 11 p.m. on Dec. 18 and 8 a.m. on Dec. 20, someone broke into a Chevrolet Uplander parked on the 1000 block of Lathrop and stole an iPhone 6, $200 cash and a real estate textbook.
A woman parked her Jeep on the 700 block of Hannah at 11:37 a.m. on Dec. 17. She took her child to a nearby park, where the two played for about 30 minutes. When she returned to her Jeep, she found someone broke her driver’s door and stole her purse. The purse contained $100 in cash, her driver’s license, several credit cards, and her mother’s medical marijuana card.
Sometime between 8 p.m. on Dec. 10 and 9 a.m. on Dec. 11, someone broke into a Kia parked on the 7700 block of Van Buren and stole a pair of prescription sunglasses, hand sanitizer and the car manual, totaling $70. The victim reported the theft to police on Dec. 17 and said he must have forgotten to lock his doors.
Christmas presents stolen
Between 8 a.m. Dec. 19 and 6:30 p.m. Dec. 20, someone broke into a home on the 1100 block of Lathrop, rummaged through closets and opened then stole Christmas gifts.
These items were obtained from police reports filed by the Forest Park Police Department, Dec. 16-21, and represent a portion of the incidents to which police responded. Unless otherwise indicated, anybody named in these reports has only been charged with a crime. These cases have not been adjudicated.
Compiled by Nona Tepper
