An Elgin man has been charged with shooting another man in the face after stealing a shoe box of marijuana from him at gunpoint, prosecutors said.
Ryan Ratliffe, 27, was arrested on a warrant at his cousin’s home in Chicago this week following the Dec. 1 shooting in a shopping center parking lot in the 4600 block of West Higgins Road in Hoffman Estates, authorities said.
He appeared Wednesday in Cook County Circuit Court in Rolling Meadows on charges of attempted murder, armed robbery and aggravated battery with a firearm, and he was ordered to be held without bond.
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Assistant State’s Attorney Caitlin Casey said Ratliffe was one of three men — the other two were arrested earlier and are also in custody — who arranged for a marijuana buy in the parking lot that night. When Ratliffe approached the seller’s car, Ratliffe pointed a gun at the man, grabbed a shoe box full of marijuana and ran, she said. The man chased Ratliffe, who the prosecutor said fired one shot from a 9-millimeter handgun.
Casey said the bullet shattered the teeth of the victim, a 26-year-old man from McHenry, and damaged an artery and his vocal cords. He has undergone multiple surgeries at Advocate Lutheran General Hospital and as of Wednesday remained in critical by stable condition after the insertion of a feeding tube, she said.
In denying bail to Ratliffe, Judge Joseph Cataldo said that Ratliffe was on probation for a criminal damage to property conviction at the time of the alleged robbery and shooting and faces a possible life sentence if convicted of the new charges.
Ratliffe’s alleged accomplices — Luis Segovia, 18, of West Chicago, and Rasool Haleem, 31, of Streamwood — were arrested last week and charged with the same offenses as Ratliffe, authorities said. Casey said both men implicated Ratliffe as the shooter and Segovia admitted he drove Ratliffe to the scene. Segovia and Haleem are both being held on $2 million bonds.
George Houde is a freelance reporter.