Homeless man charged with jogger attack in Elgin
A 21-year-old homeless man was charged Thursday in last week's attack of a female jogger in Elgin, police said.
Cody M. Sarantakos was charged with unlawful restraint and aggravated battery, and will appear in Kane County bond call Friday morning, Police Cmdr. Dan O'Shea said in a news release.
The victim, a 18-year-old Elgin woman, was approached just before noon June 3 on a bike path near McBride Street north of Kimball Street and thrown to the ground, police said. A bicyclist saw the attack and called the police, who used a K-9 unit to track the man but couldn't find him.
Detectives from the major investigations division followed up on leads and reviewed video surveillance footage from nearby businesses and identified Sarantakos, who was arrested about 10 a.m. Thursday, O'Shea said.
"Random and unprovoked physical assaults, such as in this case, take on the highest priority for our detectives. This arrest was possible because the police department and the citizens worked together to identify the perpetrator," Police Chief Jeff Swoboda said in the release. "When everyone gets involved, criminals are apprehended."
According to court records, this arrest is not Sarantakos' first brush with the law.
According to Kane County court records, Sarantakos, then of the 400 block of Douglas Avenue, Elgin, was arrested and charged for felony burglary stemming from an April 25, 2015, incident in Elgin.
In mid-May, Sarantakos pleaded guilty to the reduced charge of attempted burglary, which is still a felony, and received 24 months probation, served 12 days in jail and was fined $685, records show. If a judge determines Sarantakos violated his probation, he could be resentenced to up to five years in prison.
In his guilty plea to attempted burglary, prosecutors also settled two other pending cases against Sarantakos: misdemeanor retail theft charges stemming from an April 15, 2015, incident in Elgin were dismissed and he get received conditional discharge, which is a form of probation, for misdemeanor charges of theft of services on April 13, 2015, from Gail Borden Public Library in Elgin. A charge of criminal damage to property at the library also was dismissed, court records show.