Chicago police are investigating a series of armed robberies that swept through the River North neighborhood early Saturday, including a kidnapping in which two men drove a victim to three different convenience stores to withdraw cash from ATMs.
That incident, the earliest reported of the night, began around 2 a.m. near the corner of Maple and Dearborn streets. According to a preliminary CPD report, two men lured the victim into a vehicle, displayed a gun, and then made a circuit of nearby stores, ordering him to withdraw cash from ATMs. They eventually released him in River North, but not before taking his phone. The suspects were described only as Black males.
About a half-hour later, around 2:30 a.m., another man was robbed in the 400 block of North Clark Street. Witnesses reported seeing a crew of four or five men jump out of two vehicles, attack the victim, and then speed off toward Kinzie Street. Officers responded and located the victim, but he chose not to file a formal report, according to a CPD officer at the scene…