Manhunt Still On For Orland Park Carjacker
ORLAND PARK, Ill. (STMW) - A manhunt is under way for a man who carjacked a woman Monday night in a south suburban Red Lobster parking lot, then escaped after a police chase, leaving his female accomplice behind.
A 24-year-old woman restaurant employee called police at 11:53 p.m. Monday and reported she was carjacked at gunpoint in the Red Lobster parking lot 14750 S. La Grange Rd. in Orland Park, according to Orland Park police.
She got out her vehicle, leaving her purse inside, Orland Park police Sgt. Scott Malmborg said. A woman then came out from some bushes where she was hiding and got in the car with the man.
The woman said the carjacker sped off, but police spotted the car at 167th Street and LaGrange Road, pursued it westbound on 167th, then northbound on Liberty Circle, a dead end where the carjacker fled on foot and left the 22-year-old woman in the passenger seat.
April D. Schmidt was taken into custody, according to police, who found a replica Beretta BB/pellet gun and the victim's purse inside the car.
A Cook County Sheriff's police helicopter and Joliet police bloodhound searched the heavily wooded area, but could not find the carjacker, identified by police as Jonathan Sarolas.
Schmidt, of the 2700 block of Windham Terrace Drive in downstate Wood River, was charged with one count of aggravated vehicular hijacking, police said. She appeared in Cook County court Wednesday and was released on electronic home monitoring. She will be back in court in Bridgeview on July 16.
Sarolas is described as a 23-year-old white man whose last known address was in the 13500 block of Erin Drive in Homer Glen, police said. He is a 6-feet-5 and 190 pound man with brown hair and hazel eyes.
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