LINCOLN SQUARE — Neighbors are hoping their photos of a man found masturbating near the playground behind McPherson Elementary last week will help police catch the offender.
A resident, who preferred to be identified only by her first name of Jessica, shared the images with DNAinfo.
Last Thursday in the early evening, Jessica and her boyfriend Mike were walking across the McPherson campus toward Lawrence Avenue when Jessica heard her boyfriend say, "Oh my God, do you see that?"
"He started shouting, 'Hey, hey, get away,'" she recalled.
She turned her head in time to see the middle-aged male — dressed in a red shirt, black cap and dark athletic shorts — pull up his pants.
Jessica said she asked her boyfriend whether the man could simply have been urinating behind the school's large stone sign.
He responded that he had seen the man "visibly jerking," she said.
The couple called 911 and also snapped blurry photos of the man as he rode away on his bike, heading east on Lawrence Avenue.
"It was kind of a paralyzing moment," she said. "It was so sickening. We were nauseous."
The couple emailed staff at McPherson, 4728 N. Wolcott Ave., about the incident.
Though students are on summer break, the playground still is open to the public, and there were several families present Thursday night, Jessica said.
The school's security personnel responded to her message, requesting her photographs and said they would check McPherson's security cameras.
Saying "almost nothing bad happens in this neighborhood," Jessica added that she still felt safe walking around the area but would be on guard for suspicious behavior near playgrounds.
"I'm not nervous at all. It's more that I want to be a little vigilante," she said. "This neighborhood doesn't scare us. But it was gross."
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