A 26-year-old man accused of sexually assaulting and robbing a woman he followed off a CTA Red Line train in Rogers Park was ordered held without bail Wednesday.
“The method of the attack endangers everyone,” Cook County Judge Adam Bourgeois Jr. told Milton Anderson.
After attacking the victim early Sunday morning, Anderson made lewd comments about what he wanted to do to her sexually and told her he tried to look up her skirt on the train, Assistant State’s Attorney Robert Kline said.
Anderson followed the woman off the northbound train at the Jarvis stop about 4:40 a.m., Kline said. He then allegedly came up behind the woman in the 1400 block of West Jarvis and put his hands over her mouth.
The victim struggled and screamed and the two fell to the ground, Kline said. Anderson took out a silver handgun and threatened to shoot if the woman didn’t stop screaming, Kline said.
He demanded her underwear and purse and took her iPhone, Kline said. After the woman gave Anderson the password to her cellphone, Anderson unzipped her coat and sexually assaulted her and fondled her breasts under her clothes, Kline said.
When a resident came out to walk his dog, the 25-year-old woman cried out to him. The resident yelled at Anderson, who ran away with the victim’s purse and cellphone, Kline said. The resident helped the woman up and took her to his apartment where he let her use his phone to call police, Kline said.
The woman, who was taken to St. Francis Hospital in Evanston, suffered from soreness to her jaw, body and groin.
She later went over photos from the CTA with detectives and identified herself, prosecutors said.
The police issued a community alert and on Monday someone who recognized Anderson from a community center persuaded him to turn himself in, Kline said.
That person took Anderson to the Area North police station after Anderson came into Ald. Joe Moore’s 49th Ward office on Monday, authorities said. Moore also accompanied Anderson when he turned himself in to detectives.
Anderson confirmed that it was his picture being “shown on the news,” his police report said.
Anderson, who made “a partial admission” about what he had done to someone, had a backpack with him but left it in the car of the person who had driven him, Kline said. Police issued a search warrant for the backpack and found the victim’s belongings inside, Kline said.
The woman identified Anderson as her attacker, Kline said.
Moore thanked the neighborhood activist for helping in Anderson’s arrest.
“I am relieved that he is no longer on the streets, and I’m extremely grateful for the work of the community activist who encouraged Anderson to turn himself in,” Moore said in a statement.
Anderson, of the 1700 block of West Juneway, was charged with armed robbery with a firearm and aggravated criminal sexual assault.
Anderson has a prior felony robbery conviction and several misdemeanors, including convictions for public indecency, Kline said.
Contributing: Sam Charles, Jordan Owen
