Chicago police are searching for a man accused of walking up to a woman inside the CTA Red Line station at State and Lake and grabbing her without her consent. The incident happened on September 3, and investigators are now asking the public for help identifying the suspect.
According to ABC7 Chicago, the man approached the woman at the State and Lake station and grabbed her behind without her consent, police said. The outlet reports Chicago police are seeking the suspect.
Under Illinois law, this kind of unwanted contact can carry serious weight. Criminal sexual abuse is generally a Class A misdemeanor for a first offense, while a Class 4 felony applies to a second offense or certain circumstances, according to the Illinois General Assembly.
A Loop Station Mid-Overhaul
The State and Lake stop sits at one of the busiest transfer points in the Loop, and it's currently in the middle of a major transformation. The elevated portion of the station closed in January for a three-year, $444 million demolition and reconstruction project, per Time Out, though the underground Red Line subway station at the site has stayed open to riders throughout construction.
The location has generated sex crime reports before. In December, an assault of a disabled woman was reported at Jackson. The following month, CPD Area Three detectives working with CTA staff arrested a different suspect within 11 hours of a sexual abuse incident, a case Hoodline covered in its report on the 11-hour arrest.
A Pattern Across CTA Lines This Month
The State and Lake case is not isolated within the past two weeks. Two days after the September 3 groping, another man sexually abused a woman at the CTA Blue Line's Cumberland station, police said, a case Hoodline detailed in its coverage of the Blue Line attack. And last Friday, Chicago police issued a warning after multiple sexual abuse cases in Avondale, a spree Hoodline reported on separately.
These incidents are unfolding against a backdrop of stepped-up enforcement efforts across the transit system. In May, Cook County State's Attorney Eileen O'Neill Burke launched the Regional Transit Task Force, bringing together the Chicago Police Department, the Cook County Sheriff, the CTA, the FBI, the ATF, and federal prosecutors to share intelligence and coordinate prosecutions of transit-related violent and sexual crimes, according to CBS News.
Signs, Cameras and a Widening Federal Push
That same office partnered with the CTA in July to install more than 7,000 signs across buses and train cars warning riders that prosecutors will routinely seek pretrial detention for anyone charged with violent felonies on public transit, per FOX 32 Chicago. Federal prosecutors have also expanded the Department of Justice's Project Safe Neighborhoods program to cover the CTA's entire rail network and downtown financial corridors, the first time the anti-violence initiative has been deployed on a mass transit system anywhere in the country, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
The CTA itself submitted an updated Security Enhancement Plan to the Federal Transit Administration in March, promising to increase system policing hours by 75 percent, according to Mass Transit. The article also discusses crime across CTA locations in 2025. It also discusses assault rates on CTA and peer systems.
Anyone with information is encouraged to contact investigators.
