A man has been charged with racing his car through a group of people outside a well-known gay bar in South Shore earlier this month, killing three and injuring a fourth.
In announcing the charges against Tavis Dunbar, 34, police said they were still without a motive and have no evidence yet that the attack was a hate crime.
“Why did he do this? We don’t know that,” Chief of Detective Brendan Deenihan told reporters Tuesday morning, hours after Dunbar was charged with three counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder.
Deenihan said it does not appear Dunbar was involved in any altercation with the people he hit outside the Jeffery Pub at 70th and Jeffrey on Aug. 14. Dunbar had the accelerator floored and there are no signs that he braked when he struck the group of people standing in the street.
Videos showed victims being hurled through the air, and a police report noted that at least one of them landed on the next block.
Some of the people in the street had been involved in an argument but Dunbar was not involved, police said. While they tussled in front of the bar, Dunbar walked to a car and drove straight into the group, “apparently a random act,” Supt. David Brown said at the news conference.
The car was recovered blocks away by Chicago police, but Dunbar remained at large. The car’s “black box” indicated that Dunbar was driving at a high rate of speed, but Deenihan did not say how fast he was going.
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Police tracked down the owner of the car who helped police identify Dunbar, Deenihan said. He was taken into custody Monday morning after his attorney contacted police and arranged for his surrender, according to the arrest report.
Dunbar was scheduled to appear in bond court Tuesday. Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx told reporters her office has asked Dunbar be held without bail.
“This was a horrific, horrific tragedy here in the city of Chicago,” Foxx said.
Dunbar previously pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of domestic battery in 2011 and was sentenced to a year of probation, which he later violated and didn’t successfully complete, according to Cook County court records. He has also had two protective orders taken out against him.
(Source: Sun-Times Media Wire & Chicago Sun-Times 2022. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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