Riverside police say that a road-rage incident that occurred in the village on March 21 was motivated by race and have charged a 41-year-old Hodgkins man with two counts of assault and one count of reckless driving in connection with it.
Riverside police said Alexander M. Borrego was not provoked when he sped up to a vehicle driven by a 39-year-old white woman, who was driving her 21-year-old son, who is black, to work.
It was just after 3 p.m. when Borrego allegedly pulled up next to the woman at a high rate of speed while she was driving northbound on First Avenue from Ogden Avenue. Borrego reportedly cut off the woman twice and hurled racial epithets at her son and cursed at the woman and spat at the vehicle before giving both of them an obscene hand gesture and turning east on 31st Street.
The woman went to the Riverside police station to report the incident, giving them a license plate number for the van driven by the man. On March 19, Riverside police made contact with the Borrego, who denied that an altercation took place. He also refused to surrender to police.
On March 21, Hodgkins police arrested Borrego at his residence and he was turned over to Riverside police. Borrego posted bond and awaits an April 20 court date.
Guns, knives, alcohol, pot
A 33-year-old Brookfield man faces two felony charges for unlawful use of a weapon along with other weapons- and drug-related charges after Brookfield police arrested him at a car wash in the 9300 block of 47th Street about 6:25 p.m. on March 23.
Police received a call from a witness, who said that an occupied black 2000 Chevy was parked for a half hour in a bay at the car wash. When police arrived, the driver got out and put money in the coin box and began spraying down his vehicle.
The officer asked if the man was OK and asked to see the manfs license. The driver, later identified as Efrain Guerrero, gave the officer a business card and told the officer he was fine.
However, a computer check of Guerrerofs name reportedly showed that his license was revoked and that he had two outstanding warrants for his arrest. After taking Guerrero into custody, police reported finding a bottle of hard cider and a 200 ml bottle of whiskey from the center console.
Inside the console, police reported finding a pint of cognac along with a loaded .32-caliber revolver, a loaded .38-caliber automatic pistol, a cane with a pull-out sword device, a knife with a 3.5-inch blade, two plastic baggies and a plastic prescription bottle containing cannabis, a pipe for smoking cannabis and a spent .38-caliber shell casing.
Guerrero reportedly did not possess a firearms owner ID card. The revolver was possibly stolen, police reported.
Too good to be true
A 38-year-old Chicago woman was scammed out of $400 by a man who told her he could get her a steep discount on two iPads at Sears in the North Riverside Park Mall, 7501 Cermak Road.
The woman said the man approached her on March 24 about 7:45 p.m. in the parking lot at Petco, 2204 Harlem Ave., and said he had a friend who had iPads for sale. The woman agreed to buy two for $400, gave the man her phone number and agreed to meet with him at Sears near the package pick-up.
Fifteen minutes later, the man called the woman and told her he couldnft meet her at Sears. Instead, he told her to put the money in an envelope and leave it in the bedding department, where he said he left an envelope containing invoices for the iPads, which she could take to the customer service desk.
The woman exchanged envelopes and then walked to the electronics department, where she began to have second thoughts. When she got back to the bedding department, the envelope containing the cash was gone. Inside the envelope she held were newspaper pages, not invoices.
Wallet taken from employeefs SUV
An employee at Rizza Ford, 2100 Harlem Ave., North Riverside, reported on March 19 that during work that day someone entered his 1999 Chevy Tahoe and removed his wallet and $30 in cash from the center console.
According to the police report, the vehicle was unlocked during the day.@
These items were obtained from police reports filed by the Riverside, North Riverside and Brookfield police departments, March 19-25, 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 Bob Uphues
