Three suspects were arrested following a high-speed chase after a CBS News Chicago television crew was attacked while setting up for a live broadcast near the Adler Planetarium in Chicago. According to police, the incident occurred just before 4:30 p.m. on Monday. A white tow truck pulled up and parked directly in front of the journalists’ van, and the occupants initiated a confrontation with the crew.
Witnesses stated that a man exited the vehicle with a dog and approached the crew, shouting racial slurs directed at the photographer, who is Black. The man then ordered his dog to attack the crew, but when a crew member attempted to defend himself, the remaining two men inside the tow truck joined in. One suspect smashed the photographer’s camera, while another used a traffic cone to shatter the windshield of the news broadcast truck before the group fled.
The news crew was not physically injured. A CBS spokesperson said in a statement, ‘We are shocked and horrified by this crime and we are grateful that our journalists are safe.’ The suspects were arrested approximately 20 minutes later following a separate incident, in which the same tow truck was involved in an incident near 42nd Street and Western Avenue in Brighton Park, where the occupants allegedly pointed a firearm at pedestrians. Authorities recovered a firearm from the tow truck, but stated that it had not been pointed during the initial attack on the journalists.
The assault comes amid an ongoing national debate over public safety in Chicago, fueled by recent fluctuations in the city’s crime statistics. A string of Juneteenth weekend shootings that left eight people dead and 39 wounded raised new questions regarding the city’s security. The spike in holiday weekend violence prompted President Donald Trump to criticize Illinois Governor JB Pritzker and Chicago, claiming on social media that he could ‘fix’ the issue and demanding that the governor request federal assistance.
Pritzker responded by mocking the president’s management of federal infrastructure and his foreign policy decisions regarding Iran. Recent police data indicates that the Juneteenth bloodshed pushed Chicago killings up 9 percent this year through Sunday, with overall shootings rising 5 percent compared to the same period in 2025. However, broader law enforcement data reveals a decline in other offenses.
According to Christopher Herrmann, an associate professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City, there were nearly 1,600 crimes reported in Chicago last week, representing a 21 percent decrease from the same week last year. ‘Everything else is down quite a bit in Chicago last week, and pretty much over last month, and pretty much for a good chunk of the year,’ Herrmann said.
