Thieves Steal Backhoe In Calumet Heights, Rip Open ATM In Rogers Park
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Thieves stole a backhoe from the Calumet Heights neighborhood Thursday afternoon, and then used it to tear open an ATM more than 20 miles away in Rogers Park overnight.
"This is crazy. This is insane! What is wrong with us?" said Rogers Park resident Gina Stewart. "This is what we're doing now? This is what we've resorted to? This is absolutely insane."
Police said the backhoe was stolen from a construction site on the South Side, and then used to break into an ATM in a strip mall on the 1400 block of West Morse Avenue.
"I've lived in Chicago all my life and I've never seen anything like this," Stewart said.
Sources said the backhoe is owned by the Meade construction company, and was taken from a construction site near 89th Street and Constance Avenue around 4 p.m. Thursday.
Using GPS, it was later tracked to the strip mall in Rogers Park, approximately 180 city blocks away, in the early morning hours on Friday.
Surveillance video from a nearby liquor store shows a car pull up to the strip mall around 1 a.m., with the backhoe following closely behind.
Once the thieves got the backhoe to the strip mall in Rogers Park, they used its jackhammer to smash open the ATM, but it's unclear how much money was stolen.
"How could somebody do something like this and nobody hear anything?" said Marshall Jenkins, who works at Sudz Laundry at 1425 W. Morse Ave.
The damage to the ATM was catastrophic. The thieves were able to use a jackhammer and destroy the entire thing, getting deep inside the guts of the machine.
"I've seen where a lot of crooks they will take the small ATMs but this like takes the cake," said Julius Mercer of Rogers Park.
"They took this tractor, came all the way across the city to do this? And nobody says anything? They can steal a tractor and come all the way over here? This is crazy!" Stewart added. "We have lost our minds."
No one was in custody Friday evening.
