Robbers don’t usually leave phone numbers behind, but on Monday, at a Northwest Side muffler shop, a man asked employees to give him a call when their boss came back to open a safe, an employee said Tuesday.
When 18-year-old Ruben Zarate returned a few hours later, plainclothes Chicago police officers shot and wounded him, police said.
The incident started about 8 a.m., when the masked, armed man came in to Velasquez Mufflers For Less at 2600 N. Laramie Ave. and began demanding money, said Jose Sida, 37, a mechanic.
Employees told him they had little money and couldn’t open the safe, so the man left two phone numbers for them to call when the owner returned with the combination, Sida said.
“He said, ‘You guys better call me because otherwise I’m going to come back to shoot you,’ ” Sida said.
Instead, an employee called police.
Officers dressed in plainclothes came to the shop and told employees to call the man, Sida said. The man returned about noon, wearing the same mask and black clothing, Sida said. And after employees were told to go to the back of the shop, police shot him, Sida said.
Mark Payne, a spokesman for the Independent Police Review Authority, confirmed that his agency was investigating the police-involved shooting.
Sida said the man’s idea to leave his phone numbers was “stupid,” but said employees were just following police instructions to call him back.
Employees are worried the man’s friends may return to get back at the shop employees for calling police. “We followed police instructions, otherwise he would have come back for sure [to rob us],” Sida said.
