WEST ROGERS PARK — Store owner Nisha Soni said she couldn't help but giggle when reviewing the surveillance video of a man trying to steal an ATM from her family's convenience store.
"Honestly, I was laughing," said Soni, 32, while at the store this week. "You feel like that guy's dumb."
The camera at Quick Stop, 2751 W. Pratt Blvd., captured the burglary early last month, which included an hourslong effort by the suspect to cut a hole in the store's ceiling in an apparent effort to avoid security systems.
The burglary was among a spree that prosecutors said was carried out by Justin Jordan, 24, arrested and charged Tuesday with attempting to break into an apartment building he allegedly tried to burglarize a month earlier.
Jordan, of the 6200 block of North Mozart Avenue, is being held on $100,000 bail on four felony burglary charges.
The spree began on Dec. 5, four days after Jordan was put on probation on felony drug charges, court records show.
Jordan first broke a window at a CVS, 3825 W. Devon Ave., in North Park, prosecutors said. He tried to steal an ATM there but was unsuccessful, prosecutors said.
Then, two days later, Jordan broke into the Quick Stop in West Rogers Park, according to Assistant State's Attorney Lorraine Scaduto, who spoke at brief bond hearing Tuesday.
Soni, whose family owns the store, said police detectives made a copy of the surveillance video. The family didn't keep a copy of the video, according to her father-in-law, Arvind Soni.
But Soni described the burglary as comical. She said the man first arrived outside the shop about 2:40 a.m. Dec. 7. He tilted the angle of one of the outside cameras so it was facing downward, she said.
Then, around 6 a.m., the man could be seen jumping from the ceiling, where he apparently drilled a 2-foot-wide hole, Soni said.
"He spent three to four hours to cut the roof," she said.
In the next 30 minutes, Soni said, the masked man tried in vain to lift the ATM onto a red dolly just outside the front door he'd unlocked and opened.
She said he then dragged the machine into the back door, when an alarm finally triggered.
He fled, leaving the ATM behind. It was still sitting at the front of the store Tuesday, awaiting repairs.
But Jordan's spree continued, prosecutors said.
On Dec. 11, he allegedly broke a window of an apartment building in the 2600 block of West Glenlake Avenue. A resident of the building, who asked not to be identified, said another resident called police, and Jordan fled empty-handed.
There was an apparent monthlong lull in Jordan's burglary attempts.
But he allegedly tried again.
About 4:30 a.m. Monday he returned to the apartment building on Glenlake and broke into the basement laundry room, according to court documents. A resident called police, who arrested him there with two backpacks filled with burglary tools, police said.
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