Arlington Heights police said they are following “strong leads” in the early-Monday kidnapping of a resident who said he escaped hours after his abduction in Chicago while his captors were asleep.
Police said they suspect the kidnappers abducted the 42-year-old Arlington Heights man in a failed attempt to recapture an alleged debt owed by the victim’s brother.
“They’re looking to collect on their debt,” said village Police Cmdr. Jerry Lambert. “I don’t know if it was ransom or if they were trying to get (the money) from” the Arlington Heights man.
Police could not say how much money the kidnappers were after, nor would they comment on the source of the alleged debt. They said the abductors made no contact with the victim’s brother to say they were holding him for ransom.
“We have leads that we are pursuing. They’re strong leads,” said Lambert.
The incident occurred shortly after midnight Sunday outside an apartment complex in the 1100 block of East Algonquin Road.
The man, his wife and daughter had driven home from a wedding and just pulled into a parking space outside their apartment when a black car stopped behind them and three men got out.
The man told police that one of the men pointed a handgun at him and told his wife and daughter, “All we want to do is talk to him.”
He said the gunman grabbed him by the hair and forced him into the black car. The other two assailants pushed the mother, 41, and struck the daughter, 20, when they tried to intervene, he said.
Two of the kidnappers sped away in the vehicle with the victim, and the third fled on foot through the apartment complex, police said. Neither the mother nor the daughter was seriously injured, police said.
Police said the man was taken to a residence on the North Side of Chicago, where he was tied up with electrical cord.
He said he escaped between 7 and 8 a.m. Monday after his kidnappers fell asleep, police said.
With his hands bound behind his back, the man ran to Swedish Covenant Hospital, 5145 N. California Ave., where medical personnel summoned police. Police said the victim was not injured.
