RIVER NORTH — River North residents are grappling with a surge in street robberies as police continue to investigate last week's killing of bartender Marques Gaines in the neighborhood.
The seven River North robberies reported in January — all in the overnight or morning hours — are the most to start a year since nine in the neighborhood were reported in January 2005, according to the city's crime data portal.
Just one robbery was reported in the first four weeks of 2015 in the police beat roughly bounded by State Street, Chicago Avenue and the Chicago River.
The neighborhood's robbery surge preceded last week's killing of Marques Gaines, a bartender who was hit by a car early Feb. 7 after getting knocked unconscious on Hubbard Street. Though police initially said Gaines was involved in a heated argument, nearby security and others believe he was robbed.
"It doesn't surprise me, either," Gerry, a doorman at Mother Hubbard's, 5 W. Hubbard St., previously told DNAinfo Chicago. "There's been so many robberies on this strip late at night, and the police haven't been doing anything about it."
The Cook County Medical Examiner's Office and police said their investigations of Gaines' death are ongoing.
Police data shows the River North robberies became more frequent starting Nov. 24. Eleven robberies were reported in the last five weeks of 2015, up from five during the prior five-week period and just three in the last five weeks of 2014.
Police and Ald. Brendan Reilly (42nd), whose ward covers the police beat, did not return messages seeking comment about the uptick in River North robberies.
Gaines, 32, moved here from Georgia and tended bar at the Chicago Marriott Hotel on Michigan Avenue for years. Friends and colleagues remembered him for his vibrant demeanor, and not for getting in fights.
"There was just never a dull day with Marques — even on our bad days, he would find a way to make it fun," Rudy Coronel, Gaines' former coworker, previously told DNAinfo Chicago. "I really can't believe he would do that — he just wasn't a fighter, it wasn't his way."
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