A Chicago man was taken into custody during a raid Friday afternoon in the Little Village neighborhood, ending a search for the suspect in a murder earlier this month in west suburban Lyons.
Brian Cruz was arrested around noon in Chicago, following a three-week manhunt for the man who stabbed 62-year-old Paresh Jhobalia to death in the 4200 block of South Lawndale, according to village of Lyons spokesman Ray Hanania. Jhobalia, who lived blocks away, was found dead inside his vehicle Nov. 17 after he was reported missing from Downers Grove.
An autopsy found Jhobalia died from multiple sharp force wounds, and his death was ruled a homicide, the Cook County medical examiner’s office said.
Cruz had been on the run since Nov. 10, the day Jhobalia went missing, authorities said. Authorities uncovered Jhobalia’s body seven days later while searching his Lyons home and charged Cruz, who was thought to have been one of the last people to see Jhobalia before his disappearance, with first-degree murder.
On Friday, Lyons police had narrowed Cruz’s whereabouts to a home in the Little Village neighborhood when a tipster identified the address, Hanania said. He was warned to be “armed and very dangerous,” with a rap sheet that includes “street gang involvement.”
Cruz was next scheduled to appear in bond court on Saturday.
