Hyde Park businesses weary after string of robberies

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Art Chotipradit was scribbling down a man’s Italian beef order last weekend, when he realized this customer wasn’t in the mood for a sandwich.

“I look up. Next thing I know, I have a gun in my face. I just went numb,” said Chotipradit, a clerk at Windy’s Deli, 1013œ E. 53rd St.

Chotipradit, 39, said he gave the gunman $200 to $300 from the cash register before the man and another armed assailant left the shop, where President Obama would grab a corned beef sandwich during his days as a state senator.

It was unclear whether the Windy’s Deli holdup was one of the dozen or more armed robberies police were warning residents in the South Side’s 4th Ward about.

But Chotipradit and neighboring businesses are wary after a string of robberies this month took place an area bordered by 47th and 55th streets and Drexel and Dorchester.

The Jan. 22 robbery was the third time his store was robbed in seven years, Chotipradit said.

But local businesses can’t operate in fear, he said.

“We have to keep making money,” he said.

Robert Hunter, who cuts hair at nearby Brown’s Barber Shop, agreed.

“I’m just not scared,” Hunter said. “It’s that Marine training. I guess military men don’t get scared.”

University of Chicago graduate student Prabhdeep Kaur, who was walking near the area Saturday, said she has always been cautious since moving into the neighborhood, but now she is extra careful.

“Right now I don’t go out after 6:30 p.m.,” the 23-year-old Rogers Park native said.

Anyone with information is asked to call police at (312) 747-8382.