May 1, 2007 ~3:50 p.m. Chicago.
Walking down the sidewalk a block and a half northwest from my apartment hours after school, I noticed some guys jumped onto the sidewalk behind me. Half a block later I enter a park and walk in. The guys then are at the entrace and holler at me. I turn around and 1 of them shakes his head for me to come over. I walk on over and the guy asks me if I got any money. I continue walking until I stop where some 4 of them stand surrounding me and I reply what. He asks again and I reach into my pocket and give out 5 bucks to him. He was a light-complexity Hispanic with a red cap, so that was that, and as I turned back a black guy behind me asks if that's all I got and I reply yea. The original guy responds for them to go and they sort of run-walk away back to the streets as I continue walking to the park.
|||||||x|||||||
| |
G | | G
___| |________
_________-->__
G
x = Site of where it happened.
|| = fence.
G = grass.
--> = Where I went after it happened.
On top of the middle G was where I was when I was called at.
Spring/summer ~1993 night. Chicago.
1 rainy-thunderstorm night when I was around 5 I was walking home with my maternal grandpa, (Chinese). As we crossed the street and arrive at a corner a block from our house during a bright lightning strike which lit the streets for a second or less, a group of adult blacks wearing all dark came behind us. All but 1 attacked my grandpa and knocked him down on the ground for his wallet or stealing whatever he had, where only 1 used his gloves to keep me quiet. After the robbery they ran off leaving my grandpa unconscience. I have a vague memory of running home immediately after being set free and crying while seeing a lightning strike that lit the neighborhood, and before that, black thick gloves covering my mouth and nose and struggling for air. My grandpa (age ~68) woke up later and ran home.
_| |____||||||||-||||||||_______ H _ _________x_______-->________ | | ^
There seems to be a dispute as to what year it happened. I always thought I was 4 or 5, but my Mom thought I was around 3.
June 15, 2007 2:30 - 3:00 p.m. Chicago.
September 20, 2008 ~6:45p p.m. Chicago.
From: Neal [lonelynoone@hotmail.com]
Sent: Sunday, September 21, 2008 1:20 PM
To: police@cityofchicago.org
Subject: Theft, anonymous.
Last night around 7:45 p.m., my flare, flashlight, and digital camera was stolen.
I was running laps in the park on Albany and Argyle (3100 West, 5000 North, 17th district). 1 loop is 400 meters, so I was running the 1600 meter in 7 and a half minutes. Before I did that, I put my stuff down on the grass under a tree and then went running. Right after I finished running I went back to it and all of them were gone. (Basically, someone came and stole my stuff while I ran around an oval 4 times.)
It probably wasn't anyone playing soccer in the field or anyone running laps, so probably someone from the playground and then immediately left the area.
I checked the area again this morning under the sunlight and it had not been returned.
The flare is a red emergency flare, or roadflare, around $1, from AutoZone. The flashlight is $6 from Walgreen's. The digital camera, though, was $170, from no early than spring 2006. It is Kodak and 5.0 megapixel. (However, the value of the camera probably went much down, since a 5.0 megapixel camera is much cheaper than in 2006.)
Neal Conroy.