CHICAGO – Sean Hill, the inveterate nuisance who has been arrested 75 times since 2015 and 12 times this year, won’t be arrested anytime soon. That’s because a judge ultimately decided to send him to prison.
Many of the 54-year-old’s arrests involved randomly assaulting people and grabbing women he didn’t know, usually in the inner city. But he’s going to jail for robbing a liquor store in Old Town twice this year.
On March 9, he allegedly took a bottle of Tito’s vodka from Garfield’s Beverage, 1437 North Wells, and told a store employee he had a gun. A month later, he stole a bottle of Gray Goose vodka and warned, “I will kill you if you take another step,” while reaching into his pocket as if he had a weapon, according to a CPD report.
Prosecutors charged him on May 26 with two counts of theft and larceny.
Records show Hill pleaded guilty to two counts of aggravated robbery in exchange for concurrent six-year prison sentences from Judge Aleksandra Gillespie. He is expected to be released on parole in May 2027 after serving half of that time.
But the real story is all the other problems Hill managed to cause this year.
He was arrested three times in the city in March: on two misdemeanor charges on March 8, for which he ultimately received 30 days in jail, and shoplifting on March 12 and 19. In the March 12 case, Foxtrot’s manager spoke at 23 West Maple reported that Hill stole wine in the morning, then returned and stole two more bottles later that day. A patron who tried to stop him reported that Hill raised a wine bottle over his head and threatened to hit him with it, charges that resulted in an additional charge of assault with a deadly weapon.
Prosecutors dropped all charges in both shoplifting cases on April 3.
Five days later, he was arrested again at a Near North Side Walgreens after shoplifting from the store twice on April 8. The first time he allegedly took liquor, battery-operated toothbrushes and other items and the second time two bottles of liquor.
Hill allegedly told the arresting officers that he planned to sell the merchandise on the street. Police noted that Hill “doesn’t have enough [sic] number of convictions for a felony upgrade.”
The officers were referring to one policy adopted by Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx shortly after taking office in December 2016, in which shoplifters are charged with crimes only if the value of the stolen goods exceeds $1,000, or if they have 10 prior convictions. Effective Monday, former judge and prosecutor Eileen O’Neill will replace Burke Foxx. She has vowed to enforce the state’s shoplifting laws by charging thefts of more than $300 as a misdemeanor.
Hill pleaded guilty on June 3 and received a 100-day prison sentence from Judge Donald Panarese. However, while the case was pending, he managed to get arrested three more times:
On April 22, he was charged with shoplifting from a Gold Coast 7-Eleven and possession of a crack pipe. Records show the prosecutor dismissed the case on June 21, even though he failed to show up for court.
On May 2, a woman reported Hill spit on the right side of her face in a parking garage in the 1200 block of North Wells. He pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor on the same day as the Walgreens case and received the same sentence: 100 days.
On July 21, while wearing his ankle monitor for the ongoing liquor store robberies, Hill allegedly spat in the face of a 29-year-old woman near a parking garage at State and Ohio. The next day she returned to the garage to see if she could find surveillance footage of the incident. While walking down the stairs of the garage, Hill allegedly jumped out of a hiding place. She said he politely opened the door for her and then slapped her buttocks as she passed by.
Hill was ultimately arrested the next day after a 24-year-old woman told police he “just grabbed her whole body” at an ATM in the 1100 block of North Clark, according to a CPD report. The woman told police that he grabbed her buttocks and hit her during the assault. The police found him nearby.
Police only charged Hill with three misdemeanor charges, two for the first woman and one for the second. Still under electronic monitoring, Hill was released from the police station the next morning with instructions to appear in court on September 3.
Two days later, on July 25, Hill managed to be arrested twice within nine hours. First, at 4:16 a.m., when most people under electronic surveillance should be home, Hill was arrested for theft at a hotel near the Magnificent Mile, police records show. Incredibly, police released Hill – and his ankle monitor – seven hours later, at 11:16 a.m.
By 12.40pm Hill was back in the Gold Coast. We know this because, according to a CPD report, a 39-year-old woman at the time reported that he spit on her arm and body while she was walking near Maple and Dearborn.
This time, Hill was finally brought to trial so prosecutors could try to revoke his pretrial release in the ongoing robbery cases. Judge David Kelly granted that request. In September, Hill pleaded guilty to a number of battery counts in exchange for a 250-day prison sentence.
