A Chicago man appeared in court Sunday over a violent robbery that left a man permanently disabled and in a coma for more than a month.
Kameron Dominic Alston, 24, arranged on Facebook to buy marijuana from the man, but instead attacked him and left him to die, prosecutors said Sunday. Cook County Judge Maria Kuriakos Ciesil set Alston’s bond at $600,000 in a hearing midday Sunday regarding the aggravated battery and robbery charges against Alston.
Alston reached out on Facebook to the victim, then 19, to buy marijuana, said Assistant State’s Attorney Holly Grosshans. On June 22, the two agreed to meet at a fictitious address in the Cragin neighborhood that Alston claimed was his home.
The victim arrived at the address in the 2100 block of North Leamington Avenue and found Alston was seated in the driver’s seat of a car, with a woman in the passenger seat. After the two talked for several minutes, the man pulled a bag of marijuana from his shorts pocket, and Alston then stunned him with a punch to the face, prosecutors said.
Alston grabbed at the arm with which the victim was holding the bag of marijuana and pulled him into the car. Alston then sped down the street until he hit a parked car, causing the man, whose chest, head and neck were inside the car, to be flung into the roadway. Alston fled with the drugs.
The victim was rushed to Advocate Illinois Masonic Hospital, where he was treated for serious brain and spine injuries and a broken collar bone. The victim, now 20, is paralyzed from the waist down and in both his hands from the attack.
Witnesses saw Alston “drive down the street holding onto the victim,” Grosshans said. “Video surveillance captures the defendant driving at a high rate of speed with the victim hanging out of the driver’s side window and the victim hitting a parked vehicle before tumbling off as the defendant drove off.”
In November, the victim identified Alston in a photo lineup.
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The Chicago Police Department Fugitive Apprehension Team arrested Alston on Friday at a South Side motel. Police gave his latest address as the 2600 block of South Wallace Street, but court records indicate he also had been living in a motel in the 1000 block of Devon Avenue in Elk Grove Village.