A Chicago man has been sentenced to 12 years in prison for robbing a Woodstock motel at gunpoint and battering the clerk in 2020.
Trent J. Keegan, 28, of the 4200 block of North Hazel Street in Chicago, was charged with three counts of armed violence, two counts of armed robbery, felon in possession of a firearm, theft, burglary, aggravated battery and two counts of aggravated assault.
Court documents allege that Keegan entered the Super 8 hotel, located at 1220 Davis Road in Woodstock, around 10:30 p.m. on May 17, 2020, while armed with a pistol.
Keegan “verbally walked through the armed robbery with himself while waiting for an employee at the front desk,” a police detective said in a criminal complaint.
When the staff member walked to the front desk, Keegan attempted to remove his pistol from his front pocket but it got stuck, the complaint said.
Keegan, who was wearing a mask, safety glasses and a bandana to hide his identity, walked around the corner away from the employee.
He then walked back to the front lobby and entered the employee area behind the front counter while displaying his gun, the complaint said.
Keegan grabbed the employee’s wrist and pulled it to the cash register as he demanded the employee to open it, the complaint said.
The employee handed Keegan approximately $1,000 cash. Keegan fled the business by running out of a hallway door, the complaint added.
The Boone County Sheriff’s Department assisted in the investigation by providing their canine unit to track the suspect, according to Woodstock Police Chief John Lieb.
A search warrant was executed on a Woodstock residence that produced evidence in the case, Lieb said.
With the assistance of the McHenry County Sheriff’s Department’s SWAT team and the Lake in the Hills Police Department, an additional search warrant was executed on a residence in Lake in the Hills which produced further evidence.
Lieb said that a lengthy investigation eventually led to the identification of Keegan and an arrest warrant was issued on May 26, 2020.
The Chicago Police Department’s Fugitive Apprehension Team took Keegan into custody.
Keegan, who is a convicted felon, was previously found guilty of attempted armed robbery at a Super 8 hotel in Crystal Lake in April 2015.
In that case, Keegan served 180 days in jail and was ordered to undergo drug and alcohol treatment along with three years of probation.
Prosecutors recently negotiated a plea deal in the Woodstock robbery.
Keegan pleaded guilty to one armed robbery charge, a Class X felony, in exchange for all other charges to be dismissed.
McHenry County Judge Michael Coppedge sentenced Keegan on Thursday to 12 years in prison.
The sentence is served concurrently with his previous armed robbery conviction in 2015.
Keegan was ordered to restitute the $1,000 to the hotel he robbed, court documents show.
He has also been ordered to pay over $2,300 in court fees and fines.