Police: 62-Year-Old Veteran Thrown From Balcony In Attempted Robbery In Chicago

Police are looking for a suspect they say threw a 62-year-old man over a three-story balcony during an attempted robbery Tuesday.

The man is in critical condition at an area hospital with a fractured skull after the incident in the Gresham neighborhood, the Tribune reports.

Police say the victim was walking up the steps of a building in the 7700 block of South Halsted Street shortly before 11 p.m. Tuesday when the suspect tried to rob him. Anthony Edwards, one of the building’s residents, told the Sun-Times and police he saw the suspect moments before the incident.

Edwards, who described the offender as weighing "at least” 300 pounds, told the Sun-Times, “When they got through tussling and turning, the big dude picked him up and just threw him over the banister. And he ran.”

The suspect tried to rob another person moments before his altercation with the victim, whom NBC Chicago identified as a military veteran. Niyah Frantz said she was leaving a friend's home when the suspect pulled a gun and tried to rob her.

"I put my hand over the barrel of the gun, he strikes me with his right hand...he snatches my purse and I yell for help," Frantz told NBC. Franz said the suspect fled, running up the stairs of a building before putting the victim "feet first in the air, [throwing] him over the bannister."

Police have not made any arrests yet. Meanwhile, community activist Andrew Holmes urged the man to turn himself in.

“To the person that did this crime, you know, you need to turn yourself in,” Holmes told the Sun-Times. “You can’t live with it on your conscience because, sooner or later, you never know which surveillance camera you may have run into.”