Skip to main content

Police: Attempted holdup broadcast over store intercom

  • Story Highlights
  • Gunman demanded cash from Office Depot safe
  • Police: Suspect fled after clerk tripped intercom switch
  • Man later robbed a candy store and is still at large, police say
By Greg Morrison
CNN
Decrease font Decrease font
Enlarge font Enlarge font

CHICAGO, Illinois (CNN) -- A clerk's quick flip of a switch foiled a robbery Friday at an Office Depot store in downtown Chicago, police say.

Police say the suspect had  a gun concealed in a folded newspaper.

Police say the suspect had a gun concealed in a folded newspaper.

A man wearing a light blue button-down shirt and dark slacks entered the store carrying a gun concealed in a folded newspaper, police said.

He approached one of the store's cash registers and demanded the contents of the safe, police said. The clerk refused but immediately turned on the public address system so that other customers could hear what was going on.

Hearing his threat broadcast throughout the store, the man fled.

He later robbed a nearby Fannie May candy store at gunpoint, police said, and fled that store in a white taxi. Authorities said the robber, a man between ages 30 and 40, was still at large.

No injuries were reported in either robbery.

  • E-mail
  • Save
  • Print