A judge released a man who was arrested after he allegedly fired shots from a ghost gun and then fled on foot from responding officers in Waukegan.
The Waukegan Police Department responded around 1:20 a.m. on February 14 to the area of 10th Street and Lenox Avenue for a report of shots fired.
A 911 caller reported that a male suspect was alone outside with a gun, according to Lake County Assistant State’s Attorney Colleen McConnell.
Officers arrived and located the suspect, identified as Salvador Arroyo, 19, of Waukegan, who immediately fled on foot, McConnell said.
McConnell said Arroyo ran northbound through an alley before being caught in the 900 block of South Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue in the same area where he resides.
Arroyo told officers he was “just going home.” Officers had seen the man toss an object while fleeing.
A ghost gun, which had a loaded magazine inserted, was found just feet away from Arroyo, McConnell said.
The witness who called 911 positively identified Arroyo during a showup.
McConnell said Arroyo later admitted to shooting the gun 3-4 times. He initially said he acquired the gun from someone but then said he built the gun himself using parts he purchased online.
Arroyo said he was upset over the recent death of his grandma, which led him to shoot the gun, McConnell said.
Arroyo is under the age of 21 and does not have a Firearm Owner’s Identification card or concealed carry license.
The Lake County State’s Attorney’s Office only charged Arroyo with possessing the gun and not shooting it, despite him admitting he fired the gun. He was also not charged with fleeing from police.
Arroyo was charged with four counts of aggravated unlawful possession of a weapon and one count of possession of an unserialized firearm.
“He was shooting a gun in a residential area. No one was hurt thankfully, but someone very easily could have been,” McConnell said.
The prosecutor argued that Arroyo should be held in custody pending trial because there are no conditions of release to mitigate the threat he poses.
“This defendant created this gun from parts he ordered online. There is no way this court could effectively mitigate the risk of him assembling a gun again,” McConnell said.
Lake County Judge James Simonian denied the petition to detain filed by the state’s attorney’s office and said he did not consider the offense a crime of violence.
The judge said Arroyo lacks a criminal background and noted that no one was hurt and the gun was fired into the ground.
Simonian released Arroyo from custody on Level 4 pre-trial services monitoring, subject to a curfew, ordered him not to consume alcohol or drugs and not possess any guns.
Arroyo is scheduled to appear in court again on March 12 for a status of preliminary hearing.