‘We want them caught:’ says man of attackers who carjacked, robbed and beat his father, 61, into coma near Chinatown

As his family prays for his recovery, a 61-year-old man who was beaten, “left for dead” and reportedly found by city street cleaners last week after a carjacking remains in a coma and has suffered severe and career-ending brain injuries, according to his family and police.

“We’re praying for him to get out soon,” said Alford Lew, 35, who spoke of his family’s agony on the phone in the waiting room of Stroger Hospital Thursday afternoon.

Lew, who lives in Seattle, had been hearing for a while from his mom in Chicago that crime, including carjackings, seemed all too common.

“There was a while where I was like, ‘It’s just her being paranoid,’ but it’s not. This is happening. It just seems unrecognizable.”

“It’s getting really ridiculous, actually,” said Lew of crime in the city. “I mean, it’s frustrating. We want them caught.”

His father, Jin Yut Lew, was found bleeding from the head on a sidewalk in the 2500 block of South Princeton Avenue when officers responded to an EMS call April 7, according to Officer Jose Lemus-Cortez, a spokesman for Chicago police.

The victim, who was unidentified at that time, was taken to Stroger Hospital in critical condition, Lemus-Cortez said. Two days later, police went back to the hospital because a witness had identified Lew, whose car had been reported stolen.

Alford Lew said he became worried Friday morning when his brother, Richard, contacted him.

“He’d (Richard) last seen Dad on Wednesday night — he (his dad) came by his place and grabbed the car,” Alford Lew said.

They didn’t know where he was headed to in the 2008 Lexus SUV, but the next day he was supposed to meet a friend and never showed up.

“She called my brother to check on him and that’s when he confirmed he last saw him.”

Frantic, they filed a police report Thursday night and began trying to find him by social media and calling hospitals.

“We used our own kind of around-the-neighborhood search … I’m from Seattle, I couldn’t do much, but more people found out,” Alford Lew said.

Then a breakthrough: “A college friend who I hadn’t spoken to in years called me and said. ‘Hey, my roommate works at Stroger and somebody like that wearing a blue shirt came in,’ ” he said. “I called right away and it was him.”

Thursday evening Alford Lew’s father wasn’t able to speak and remained in a coma after having at least two surgeries so far.

“They said it was like the highest level of brain injury they have classifications for,” he said.

Donations forJin YutLew, who worked as a chef for the last 40 years, had reached more than $55,000 as of Thursday evening, according to a GoFundMe site organized by Alford Lew and his brother, Richard Lew.

“Our father was carjacked, robbed, brutally beaten and left for dead near Chinatown. He was attacked repeatedly with a blunt object to the head and face and was left lying on the ground,” according to a message on the posting.

“He was found by street cleaners who reported the incident to the police and an ambulance brought him to the hospital. He required immediate brain surgery and was diagnosed with severe brain trauma, which led to swelling and internal bleeding,” the message said.

Jin Yut Lew, who immigrated to the U.S. in the early 1980s and has worked to support his family here and in China, may suffer permanent brain damage, according to his doctors, the site stated.

As they hope for his recovery, Alford Lew reflected on his dad’s hard-working life as a chef.

“As a father, he provided all he could to ensure my brother and I got a good education. In the Chinese restaurant community, he was a well-respected head chef who over 40 years gave many new immigrants their first starts and trained them in his kitchen,” the site said.

For 30 years he worked as head chef at the Chi Tung restaurant in Evergreen Park but was now working on a new project, Alford Lew said.

“With this injury, his work in the kitchen will likely be over. The road to recovery will be long and we are asking for help to assist with the medical bills, physical therapy and home care that this tragic incident will incur,” the posting said.

Area 1 detectives are investigating, but no arrests had been made as of Thursday, Lemus-Cortez said.

According to police data, carjackings in the city during the first quarter of 2022 were up slightly over the same period a year ago. There were more than 1,800 reported carjackings in 2021, according to the data, triple the number seen just two years earlier.

rsobol@chicagotribune.com

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