MELROSE PARK, Ill. (CBS) - Starting Wednesday, Chicago area residents will be buying bulk groceries, furniture and appliances on the site where they once enjoyed rides on the Little Dipper and the Galleon.

A new Costco warehouse store opens Wednesday at 8 a.m. The store is located at 8400 W. North Ave. in Melrose Park on the footprint of the iconic Kiddieland amusement park, which closed last year after 81 years of operation.

The Melrose Park Costco is one of three set to open in the Chicago area this week. A store is opening in Bolingbrook on Thursday, and another opens in Mettawa on Saturday.

Melrose Park Mayor Ron Serpico said during the summer that he welcomes the 175 or so jobs the Costco will bring at first, and an expected doubling of the tax money that Kiddieland generated.

But the loss of what at the time was Chicago’s oldest amusement park was a bitter pill to swallow for generations of Chicagoans.

Kiddieland closed in September 2009, after property owners Shirley and Glenn Rynes, the daughter and grandson of original Kiddieland owner Art Fritz, opted to not renew the lease to the amusement park owners/operators.

The amusement park was owned and operated by other descendants of Fritz.

The remaining structures on the Kiddieland site were demolished this year. But the park sold some of its rides to other parks around the country before auctioning off the rest in November, allowing some of its parts to live on elsewhere.

Six Flags Great America in Gurnee snagged The Little Dipper, a vintage wooden roller coaster built in 1950 – 21 years after Arthur Fritz first opened the amusement park. The Little Dipper now resides in the Yukon Territory section of Great America.

Most of the Kiddieland train has been moved to the Hesston Steam Museum in Indiana.

But while parts of the amusement park remain now in other places, many Chicagoans decried the loss of one of the last in a dying breed of amusement parks. And Kiddieland is not the first to be replaced by a retail complex.

Aladdin's Castle at Riverview Park, located at Western and Belmont aveues from 1904 to 1967. (Credit: CBS)

• The historic Riverview amusement park at Western and Belmont avenues closed in 1967 after 63 years in operation, to the shock and disappointment of generations of Chicagoans. A shopping center called Riverview Plaza now occupies the site, along with the Belmont District and Area police station, and a DeVry University campus.

• Hollywood Kiddieland was a small amusement park at Lincoln Avenue and McCormick Boulevard, which was not affiliated with the Melrose Park Kiddieland. After closing in 1975, it was replaced by an expansion of the adjoining Lincoln Village shopping center, including the Lincoln Village 1-6 movie theater which has itself since closed.

• Funtown, at 95th Street and Stony Island Avenue, closed in 1982. The sprawling Stony Island Plaza shopping center now stands in its place, although it didn’t open until 17 years after Funtown closed.

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (CBS) - The warehouse club retailer Costco has officially opened its new store in Melrose Park, on the former site of the Kiddieland amusement park.

The River Forest Leaves newspaper reported that shoppers from across the Chicago area lined up for the grand opening of the store at 8400 W. North Ave., which will offer low-price bulk food and other items to members.

Melrose Park Mayor Ron Serpico was present for the opening of the 152,000 square-foot store, which employs more than 200 people from the surrounding west suburban communities, the River Forest Leaves reported.

Shoppers with existing Costco memberships may shop at the Melrose Park store, but non-members may not make purchases. An executive membership at Costco is $100 a year; a general membership is $50 a year, the River Forest Leaves reported.

The newspaper quoted store membership marketing manager Kim Kapasouris as saying it was “bittersweet” to be on the site of Kiddieland, but the “good vibes” from the amusement park remain.

The Ferris wheel at the former Kiddieland amusement park in Melrose Park. (Credit: CBS)

Kiddieland closed last year after 81 years of operation.

Property owners Shirley and Glenn Rynes, the daughter and grandson of original Kiddieland owner Art Fritz, opted to not renew the lease to the amusement park owners/operators.

The amusement park was owned and operated by other descendants of Fritz.

The remaining structures on the Kiddieland site were demolished this year. But the park sold some of its rides to other parks around the country before auctioning off the rest in November, allowing some of its parts to live on elsewhere.

Six Flags Great America in Gurnee snagged The Little Dipper, a vintage wooden roller coaster built in 1950 – 21 years after Arthur Fritz first opened the amusement park. The Little Dipper now resides in the Yukon Territory section of Great America.

Most of the Kiddieland train has been moved to the Hesston Steam Museum in Indiana.

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (STMW) – A west suburban adult bookstore and two exotic dancers arrested by Melrose Park police filed a false arrest lawsuit against the village Tuesday.

The adult bookstore Excalibur Video Inc. and exotic dancers Susan Watson and Michelle Fennell claim Melrose Park police falsely arrested them and took store property April 21, 2010, according to a suit filed in Cook County Circuit Court.

The suit claims Melrose Park police entered the store at 2217 W. Lake St. in the western suburb about 9:30 p.m. April 21, 2010, searched the premises without a warrant or probable cause and arrested Watson and Fennell.

The officers took a corkboard sign, white board sign and DVD containing a video of Excalibur employees dancing, according to the suit. Watson was charged with maintaining a public nuisance and Fennell was charged with public indecency, the suit said.

Melrose Park police have refused to return the confiscated items, the suit said.

Prior to the arrests, the suit claims Melrose Park police conducted several raids on the store in 2009 and 2010 and ordered the store closed because it did not have the proper authorization to offer live dancing. The suit calls that claim false.

The three-count suit claims false arrest, unlawful detention and illegal search and seizure and is seeking more than $150,000 plus the cost of the suit from the Village of Melrose Park and police officers involved.

A village spokesperson was not immediately available for comment.

© Sun-Times Media Wire Chicago Sun-Times 2010. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (CBS) – They are a group of Chicago area police officers by day, and paranormal investigators at night.

When someone claims to have an encounter with the unknown, their job is either to refute or prove it with evidence.

They brought CBS 2’s Susan Carlson to one local haunt where they recently made a scary discovery. The look of it alone is enough to give one the creeps.

Big Timers Sound Shop, at 171 N. 25th Ave. in Melrose Park, is not scary at all from the outside. But when a worker claimed to hear voices and refused to go in the basement, he called the Paranormal Cops.

In an episode on A&E, the real-life ghostbusters believed they had a hostile interaction with … something. It whispered: “Get out. Get out of here.”

With a little digging, they discovered filled-in tunnels, and a hidden stairway behind a mirror in the women’s restroom.

It turns out that in a prior incarnation, Big Timers was a Chicago Outfit haunt called Casa Madrid. The restaurant and gambling den closed in the 1960s, but during its time, beatings and murders reportedly took place, the Chicago Sun-Times reported. It was owned by the late mobster Rocco “Gumballs” DeGrazia, the newspaper reported.

“We brought a former patron down here and he told us about one or two shootings that he was aware of, and we found blood to corroborate what he told us,” said Paranormal Cops founder Ron Fabiani,

CBS 2 walked through Big Timers with a device to pick up electromagnetic energy, often associated with the paranormal.

“It’s so cold, I can see your breath,” Carlson said as she toured Big Timers. “I have goose bumps.”

The sentiment is shared by the Paranormal Cops.

“When I went in there my intuition went to a level 10 right away,” said Paranormal Cop Tom Froelich.

Fabiani and Froelich are both a longtime police officers, but they still gets scared.

“On the inside, I’ve been scared many times,” Fabiani said.

“As cops, we don’t have the luxury of embellishing,” added Froelich. “Our job is to provide credible answers and that’s what we do in this group – provide credible answers for people.”

The paranormal cops respond to about four calls a month of unexplained phenomena in the Chicago area. They say about half the cases turn out to be nothing.

Of the other half, they say many of those cases are what they believe is contact by a deceased loved one or a peaceful spirit, simply watching over us.

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (STMW) – Workplace safety officials are investigating a west suburban recycling facility where an employee died Monday in a forklift accident.

The death marks the second fatal accident since 2007 for the company, which has been cited previously for forklift safety violations.

Osvaldo Bautista, 34, died after he was injured at work at 3800 W. Lake St. in Melrose Park, according to the Cook County Medical Examiner’s office.

A recycling center belonging to JKS Ventures is located at the Melrose Park address.

Bautista was an employee at the JKS Ventures recycling facility and was on-duty when he was involved in an accident with a forklift truck, said Diane Turek, spokeswoman for the Chicago North office Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

Bautista, of the 5500 block of West 26th Street in Cicero, was pronounced dead at 1:07 p.m. Monday at Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood, the medical examiner’s office said. A Tuesday autopsy found that he died of compression asphyxia and ruled the death an accident, according to the medical examiner’s office.

OSHA officials arrived at the facility about 2:30 p.m., shortly after the accident occurred, Turek said. Officials are investigating, although no citations relating to Monday’s accident had been issued against the company as of Wednesday morning.

JKS Ventures has previously been cited by OSHA in three separate instances since 2000, Turek said. In 2007, a worker greasing a conveyor died after falling 23 feet from the machinery OSHA records indicate. The company was issued 21 serious citations following that accident, including citations relating to forklift operations, according to Turek and OSHA records.

A follow-up inspection in 2008 led to two more citations, one of which was also for forklift safety issues, records indicate.

During Monday’s accident, Bautista became pinned between a forklift and a semi tractor trailer, sources said.

Melrose Park police and fire officials did not return calls seeking comment.

Updated 04/1/11 – 11:12 a.m.

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (CBS) – A 17-year-old boy is dead, following an apparent gang shooting in Melrose Park.

The shooting happened around 6:10 p.m. Thursday, as the victim, Jimmy Guzman, reportedly walked with his girlfriend in Sharp Park, 1609 N. 36th Ave.

The girlfriend was confronted by two other girls, who had been involved in an ongoing feud, Melrose Park police said.

When the three girls began fighting, a 16-year-old boy came up and shot Guzman several times, police said.

“He point blank shot him,’’ said Melrose Park police Chief Sam Pitassi.

Guzman, 17, of the 1600 block of North Mannheim Road in Stone Park, was dead on the scene, according to a the Cook County Medical Examiner’s office.

Police said the victim and the suspect are affiliated with rival gangs from the surrounding towns, and none of the people involved are Melrose Park residents.

The girls are classmates at Proviso West High School in Hillside, and the fight started there, according to the chief, who did not know what it was about, or if the girls are affiliated with a gang.

The suspect was identified and arrested in Berwyn, according to police, who said charges are pending. Once charged, the suspect is scheduled to appear for a bond hearing Saturday at the Maybrook Courthouse in Maywood, police said.

The Sun-Times Media Wire contributed to this report.

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (CBS) — You know the feeling. You’re driving through an intersection when suddenly, you see the red-light camera flash.

The fear of that flash has drivers in one suburb stuck in traffic -– by choice. They’re sitting at red lights, sometimes tying up traffic because they’re so afraid of getting a $100 ticket, CBS 2’s Pamela Jones reports.

Some say it’s a flashing frenzy at North and First avenues in Melrose Park — red-light cameras sometimes going off several times a minute.

But it turns out not everyone getting snapped is breaking the law. And that has drivers scared to move.

“I did that once at this very same traffic light. I stopped. I waited, and yet I was still ticketed,” one motorist said.

CBS 2 observed drivers sitting at the corner, refusing to turn right on red, even though posted signs say that is permitted as long as you make a complete stop.

CBS 2 tested the system, stopping at the corner for more than five second. The camera went off.

Drivers say they’re tired of that sinking feeling when they think they’re obeying the rules of the road, but then look up in their rear-view mirror and see the flashing lights, anyway.

Melrose Park police say drivers who stop completely before turning won’t get tickets. A police officer reviews all the images from the cameras and decides who should get ticketed.

MAYWOOD, Ill. (CBS) – A Melrose Park man has been charged with stealing more than $900,000 from his late aunt, who suffered from Alzheimer’s disease.

Cook County Sheriff’s police said that Chester Czernwinski, 59, gained power of attorney over his 91-year-old aunt in February 2005. She suffered from dementia and was a widower with no children.

Czernwinski controlled his aunt’s finances until she died in April 2008 and, during that time, he allegedly cashed out her stocks, life insurance and annuities, and sold her home. Police said he used the profits and money from joint bank accounts for his own benefit.

In all, Czerwinski allegedly stole more than $900,000 from the victim.

He was indicted on Thursday for financial exploitation of the elderly/disabled and two felony counts of theft. Bond was set at $500,000 on Friday.

Police began investigating Czernwinski in April 2010 after a relative expressed concerns about money missing from the victim’s estate. That relative has filed a civil lawsuit against Czernwinski.

Czernwinski had been unemployed since 1998, receiving only disability from Social Security.

He allegedly used the money he stole to buy jewelry and a $53,000 Lincoln Navigator and to pay for a vacation for eight to San Antonio and a $30,000 wedding for his son.

Police said that, over the years, other family members tried to intervene and visit the victim, but because the victim was living in his basement, Czernwinski blocked access.

Czernwinski was due back in court on April 14th in Maywood.

MAYWOOD, Ill. (CBS) – Cook County Sheriff’s Police have busted up a burglary ring that targeted homes across the near western suburbs.

Alfredo Ramirez, 21, of Stone Park, has been arrested and charged with five counts of burglary for his alleged role in the ring. His cousin, Juan Ramirez, 25, of Cicero, is still wanted by sheriff’s police.

The burglars hit up at least five homes in Melrose Park, Bellwood and unincorporated Leyden Township.

They went from door to door and knocked to find out if anyone was home. If there wasn’t, they would break in to steal valuables and pawn them right away.

If someone was home, the burglars would leave and move on to the next house, sheriff’s police said.

Police found out about the burglary ring after a two-flat building was burglarized on May 24, in the 10500 block of Nevada Avenue in Leyden Township. A 10-year-old girl who lived in the building called 911 after she heard someone kicking at the door to her second-floor apartment.

The burglars – of whom Alfredo Ramirez was allegedly one – had fled by the time police arrived. They had gotten into the building by prying open a window in a first-floor vestibule, and kicking in an apartment door.

They stole an X-Box and video games from the first floor apartment, where no one was home. They were about to break into the second-floor apartment, but left when they realized people were home there, police said.

Detectives collected shoe prints and fingerprints at the scene, and found a suspicious black Nissan Altima going by as they examined surveillance video from a middle school across the street.

Police caught up with the car at a bank in the 1800 block of North Broadway in Melrose Park, and pulled it over. Alfredo Ramirez was inside with the stolen goods, and was planning to meet someone at the bank who would buy them, police said.

Alfredo Ramirez admitted to taking part in the burglary ring. He and the other burglars stole iPods, laptops, cameras, video game systems, jewelry, and anything else they could get their hands on, police said.

Bond for Alfredo Ramirez has been set at $30,000. He was to appear again Thursday at the Maybrook Courthouse in Maywood.

Anyone who knows where police might find Juan Ramirez is asked to call Cook County Sheriff’s police detectives, at (708) 865-4896.

MAYWOOD, Ill. (CBS) — A Melrose Park man stands charged with burning down his father’s home, where the suspect himself also lived.

Bond for David Neubauer, 26, was set at $400,000 Wednesday at the Maybrook Courthouse in Maywood, according to the Cook County Sheriff’s office.

He is charged with one count of arson for allegedly burning down the house where he and his father lived in the 9700 block of Dickens Avenue earlier this week.

Authorities allege that on Tuesday, Neubauer called his mother and told her he was going to burn down the house. He also asked a family friend to come to the house with him, according to the sheriff’s office.

When the friend arrived, Neubauer allegedly told him to step inside the house and take a whiff, and the friend said the interior smelled of gasoline and quickly left. Outside, the friend saw Neubauer holding two Molotov cocktails, which he allegedly threw at the friend’s car, but they didn’t detonate.

The friend also discovered that Neubauer had left two plastic bottles full of gasoline on the driver’s seat of his car, which had leaked. The friend threw the bottles out the window and left the scene, according to the sheriff’s office.

Soon afterward, fire engulfed the house and soon left it completely gutted. Neubauer bolted before police and fire crews came to the scene, but police in nearby Franklin Park quickly found him at 25th and Franklin avenues in that near west suburb.

Neubauer admitted to setting his father’s house on fire, and trying to blow up the family friend’s car, according to the sheriff’s office.

The sheriff’s office did not specify Neubauer’s motive for allegedly committing the acts.

Bond for Neubauer was set at $400,000 Wednesday. He is due back in court on Thursday.

WHEATON, Ill. (CBS) – Bond has been set at $10 million for two Melrose Park men who were caught with nearly two tons of marijuana inside an Addison business.

Luis Pichardo, 32, and Ignacio Morales, 28, have been charged with one count each of felony unlawful possession of cannabis with intent to deliver, according to DuPage County prosecutors.

They appeared for a bond hearing on Sunday, when their bond was set at $10 million each.

Prosecutors said that on Friday evening, undercover officers with the DuPage Metropolitan Enforcement Group saw the two men acting suspiciously at a business at 135 Laura Dr. in Addison.

When the men left the building, an Addison police officer pulled them over for unspecified traffic violations, prosecutors said. Pichardo, who was driving, did not have a valid driver’s license and was arrested.

During the traffic stop, a police doc alerted officers to the presence of drugs in the vehicle. Police obtained a search warrant for the building on Laura Drive and discovered 3,700 pounds of marijuana inside — an estimated street value of $16.8 million.

Pichardo and Morales are scheduled to appear for arraignment on Sept. 19 at the DuPage County Courthouse in Wheaton.

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (CBS) — Twelve years ago, a panel was formed to fix a major congestion problem in the near western suburbs.

So what happened?

LISTEN: WBBM Newsradio’s Mike Krauser reports

As WBBM Newsradio’s Mike Krauser reports, the West Cook Railroad Relocation and Development Authority was formed with good intentions. Its task was to relieve congestion at 25th Avenue and the Union Pacific railroad tracks on the border between Melrose Park, the Chicago Tribune recalled.

There is a freight yard at that location, and trains often create long delays for drivers, the Tribune reports.

But a dozen years after the panel was formed, the Tribune is reporting, the authority has yet to do much more than decide on a tunnel rather than a bridge. The task of making that decision has cost more than $2.5 million.

The money has been spent by the politically-connected members of the panel on consultants, lawyers, engineering studies, cars and rent, according to the newspaper.

No dirt has been moved, and the authority is now asking for more money from taxpayers to finish what it started nearly 12 years ago, the Tribune reported.

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (CBS) — It’s a sport that has no off-season.

Nearly every Thursday and Friday, every week of the year –  since 1946, in fact — there has been harness racing at Maywood Park, a one half-mile standard-bred race track.

It is a way of life for many horse owners like Bernie and Deb Paul, who make the weekly commute here from their farm in Oregon, Ill.

“It’s a very hands-on business from an owner’s perspective,” Bernie Paul says. “At our farm I can jump on and sit behind a horse and go four jog miles with them, and so you feel like you are actually involved in getting the horse ready to go.”

Kelly is standard-bred horse, one of 28 the Pauls own. She’s rehabbing an injury right now, but when she’s racing she competes for a slice of a $4,000 purse for each of the roughly 14 races every night. There are eight horses per race.

“They have to want to be a race horse and want to beat somebody,” Bernie says.

Owner Rick Kuhlmey says people unfamiliar with harness racing may have a perception that the races are fixed. He says it’s actually a highly regulated field.

Kuhlmey started off as a paying customer in 1986, and grew to love the sport so much he now owns three horses, which he stables at the Paul farm.

The thrill of winning is particularly sweet, he says.

“Getting to the winner’s circle and standing in that winner’s circle for that 15 seconds of fame is just phenomenal,” Kuhlmey says.

Although Maywood Park has racing just two days a week, it is open every day of the week for simulcasts of other horse races around the nation.

CHICAGO (CBS) — The Alberto Culver plant in Melrose Park is shutting down, and about 600 workers will lose their jobs or be forced to transfer.

Consumer products maker Unilever PLC, which bought Alberto Culver last year, is planning to close the plant by 2013.

Unilever spokeswoman Anita Larsen told the Chicago Sun-Times the office staff at the plant in Melrose Park will be cut or transferred.

LISTEN: WBBM Newsradio’s Bernie Tafoya Reports

Workers at the plant say they’ve been told the layoffs and transfers will be phased in and the plant shuttered sometime in 2013. Larsen said the decision to close the plant resulted from “a review of the company’s manufacturing network in order to achieve cost efficiencies.”

Unilever, based in Amsterdam, acquired Alberto Culver Co. for $3.7 billion. The plant turns out Alberto VO5 and TRESemme shampoos. The plant also makes Nexxus shampoos and conditioners, as well as St. Ives lotions and body wash.

Updated 05/07/12 – 11:59 a.m.

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (CBS) — A man was killed during a bizarre home invasion in west suburban Melrose Park on Sunday.

Police said two robbers cut power to a home in the 1400 block of North 24th Avenue in Melrose Park at about 4 p.m. Sunday, then entered the home and held a woman and her two children at gunpoint.

The suspects then shot and killed Cleon Wilson, 29, when he walked in on them.

CBS 2’s Susanna Song reports police believe the man walked in on a robbery in progress, and they don’t believe the attack was random.

Police said the suspects held the woman and her children at gunpoint in a bedroom, and demanded money.

When Wilson returned home during the robbery and walked into the bedroom, he was shot and killed.

Police said Wilson and the woman were either married or dating.

The building’s landlord said the woman had been renting a unit there for the past few years.

“On the lease, it’s three persons; her and two children. One boy, one girl,” Felix de la Rosa said. “I know she’s got a boyfriend, but I see him all the time here. He looked like a normal guy, you know.”

After the shooting, the suspects fled the scene on foot and went a block south into a waiting vehicle. Police are still trying to determine if anything was taken from the home.

Residents were stunned on Monday morning.

“This is crazy, we didn’t hear anything. I had guests over, and everything, but we didn’t hear anything yesterday, and I was home all day.” said a neighbor, Linda Sloan. “The place was surrounded by police officers, bringing someone out on stretcher, and girl and daughter got in back of police car.”

No arrests had been made as of Monday morning.

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (CBS) — Questions surround the recent homicide of a retired suburban police sergeant who is fondly remembered by his neighbors.

Former Melrose Park police Sgt. Ronald Susek was fatally shot in the backyard of his home on June 14.

Witnesses have told investigators that they saw a person leaving the area shortly after the shots were heard. In a news release, the police department did not provide a description of what the witnesses saw.

Police Chief Sam Pitassi emphasized the importance of the investigation.

“Sgt. Susek was near and dear to my heart and many at the department. The moment we found out it was a homicide, we pulled out all the stops. We are working with a number of different agencies, and are working a number of good leads,” he told CBS 2.

Susek, 61, was found by a neighbor in his backyard in the 1600 block of North 14th Avenue about 6:20 a.m. He suffered gunshot wounds and was taken to Gottlieb Memorial Hospital in Melrose Park, where he was pronounced dead.

It would be “probably impossible to find anyone to say anything bad about Ronnie Susek,” Earl Filskov, a friend and neighbor, told CBS 2’s Brad Edwards.

Filskov, himself a former cop, says the investigation had problems from the beginning when investigators failed to collect all evidence from the outside crime scene.

“It’s all subject to the elements. The longer it sits outside, it deteriorates and it loses its usefulness,” Filskov said.

The medical examiner’s office ruled the shooting was a homicide.

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (CBS) – High winds may be to blame for the partial collapse of a Melrose Park building – an accident that injured two children Thursday afternoon.

The commercial building’s parapet wall collapsed at about 4 p.m., sending bricks and an awning crashing to the ground at 136 and 138 Broadway.

Firefighters say paramedics took two children, siblings who are 7 and 9, to Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood.

Witness Fernando Atilano says debris literally buried one of the victims, a little boy. When he was pulled out, he says, the child’s face was cut up.

When the collapse occurred, winds of up to 55 miles an hour were bearing down on Melrose Park, Melrose Park Fire Chief Rick Beltrame says.

“Without a warning, the façade collapsed,” he said.

Newsradio WBBM reports three others refused treatment at the scene.

LISTEN: WBBM Newsradio’s Michele Fiore reports

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (STMW) — Bond was denied on Saturday for two west suburban men charged with the murder of a 41-year-old Melrose Park woman outside of her home.

The armed robbery and fatal shooting occurred Tuesday night in the 1800 block of North 21st Street in Melrose Park, a release from Melrose Park police said. Officers responded at 7:20 p.m. to a shooting there and found Maricela Vera suffering from a gunshot wound, police said.

She was taken to Gottlieb Memorial Hospital in Melrose Park, where she was pronounced dead at 7:50 p.m., according to the Cook County Medical Examiner’s office. An autopsy found she suffered a gunshot wound to the face and her death was ruled a homicide.

Two suspects — Marquis L. Byrd, 26, and Jeffrey J. Cooper, 18 — were apprehended at the scene, police said. Byrd, of the 2100 block of 16th Avenue in Broadview, and Cooper, of the 1800 block of 15th Avenue in Melrose Park, were both charged with three counts of first degree murder, one count of armed robbery and one count of aggravated vehicular hijacking.

They are both denied bond at a hearing Saturday at the Cook County Courthouse at 26th and California.

(Source: Sun-Times Media Wire © Chicago Sun-Times 2013. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

65 year old Sharon Balleu is suing the Village of Melrose Park because of her missing dog, Beau. (Credit: STMW)

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (CBS) — 65-year-old Sharon Balleu is suing the Village of Melrose Park because of her missing dog.

Two officers responded to her house on September 7, 2012, and took her to a mental hospital for an emotional problem.

They told her they would take her 10-year-old Maltese named Beau to a local veterinarian hospital, but instead registered it as a stray, and it was adopted out.

Her attorney, Chris Smith of the Chicago law firm Smith, Johnson and Antholdt, says someone needs to be held responsible.

“This hurts, and there is some pain and damage to her on that end but the number one goal would be to have her dog and that this never happened,” said Smith.

The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court of Northern Illinois and seeks a jury trial and punitive damages.

MELROSE PARK, Ill. (STMW) – A suspect was nabbed just minutes after the robbery of a west suburban bank branch Tuesday morning by a police officer who was having coffee at a Starbucks a few doors down.

According to a federal criminal complaint filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Chicago, the robber walked into the Fifth Third Bank branch at 2501 W. North Ave. in Melrose Park just after 10:30 a.m.

He approached a teller and inquired about purchasing a vehicle sticker, a statement from the FBI said. He then demanded cash and indicated he had a weapon, although no weapon was shown. The teller handed over about $8,000 that he placed in a red bank bag before running out.

According to the complaint, three witnesses who were at the Hooters restaurant next door to the bank, saw a man run into the parking lot and approach a gray 4-door Lexus. The man was clutching a red bag to his chest and they saw a puff of red mist coming from the bag. He threw something from the bag, then got into the Lexus and drove away.

At the same time, the complaint said, a Melrose Park police officer at a Starbucks in the same strip mall heard about the robbery on his police radio. He met the witnesses, who pointed out the Lexus, which was stopped at the red light at 25th and North.

The officer ran toward the Lexus and drew his weapon. As he approached, he yelled through the open car windows for the driver to raise his hands. The driver raised his hands, but at the same time accelerated into the intersection, colliding with another car.

After the crash, police apprehended 43-year-old Eric Murchinson of Chicago, according to the complaint. He was the only person in the Lexus, in which police found a red bank bag and cash on the floor, covered in red dye.

Murchinson was turned over to the FBI and charged with one count of bank robbery. He appeared late Tuesday before Magistrate Judge Michael T. Mason and was ordered held pending his next court appearance, the release said.

If convicted, he faces up to 20 years in prison.

(Source: Sun-Times Media Wire © Chicago Sun-Times 2013. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)