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Surgeries for driver attacked during carjacking at Des Plaines auto dealership

It's one surgery down and one to go for the 36-year-old driver who was badly beaten Thursday during a carjacking at a luxury automobile dealership in Des Plaines.

Sergey Kryakushin spent Friday at Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge recovering from surgery to repair an open leg fracture he suffered during the early morning attack. The Brooklyn, New York, man will undergo surgery on his arm Saturday.

The attack was horrible, said Kryakushin, who was struck in the head and was seen on video surveillance being knocked to the ground and stumbling into a snowbank. He said he had dropped off two BMWs to Jidd Motors' service center and was about to unload a third from his car hauler trailer when four men attacked him.

"I was scared. I'm thinking these guys have guns," said Kryakushin, who recalled thinking it would be his last day on Earth.

After the carjackers took the keys and sped off in the vehicles, Kryakushin flagged down a passerby, who called police.

Recovering later in the hospital, he said he repeated to himself, "Thank you, God. Thank you, God."

The carjacking wasn't the first time thieves targeted Jidd Motors. It wasn't even the first time that night.

Owner Adam Jidd said surveillance video shows four men first breaking into the Jidd Motors Showroom on the 1300 block of Rand Road. According to Jidd, they took computers and iPads but were unable to access keys to the vehicles.

According to Des Plaines police, surveillance video shows the same men at the Jidd service center on the 800 block of Rand Road about 20 minutes later at 1 a.m. Police say the men - three Black and one white - attacked Kryakushin while he was dropping off vehicles. Police found him lying in a snowbank with wrist and leg injuries.

The offenders punched and kicked Kryakushin and demanded keys to the vehicles, which they drove away, police said.

"My heart goes out to him and his family," said Jidd, who has set up a GoFundMe account for the driver.

According to Jidd, the dealership sells between 500 and 600 vehicles per month. It opened 11 years ago and is among the largest luxury dealerships in the Midwest with close to 1,000 vehicles at the two locations, he said.

"We've become a target," Jidd said, referring to another break-in about six months ago.

His wasn't the only independent dealership scrutinized by would-be thieves.

Video surveillance at GMotorCars captured an individual throwing a brick through the window of the dealership on the 2400 block of East Oakton Street, an unincorporated area near Arlington Heights, about 12:20 a.m. Friday, nearly 24 hours after the Des Plaines incident that remains under investigation.

According to GMotorCars co-owner Joe Mok, their surveillance video shows three offenders and a vehicle that he said was the same one used in the Des Plaines crime. They backed up to a side door and one of them threw a brick through a window.

Mok said surveillance video shows the men searching for keys, then fleeing after hearing noise from the tools that members of the night crew were using.

"We were lucky," he said. "The mechanics didn't even know somebody had broken in. ... They were one door away from each other. They had no clue."

"I'm so grateful nobody got hurt," he said, adding the company will augment its security.

"Everything's a consideration right now," he said, and that includes possibly hiring outside security and leaving the lights on all night.

Mok, who serves as board president of the Illinois Independent Auto Dealers Association, said his organization is alerting members about what appear to be break-ins targeting independent dealers.

"We want to get the word out to dealer friends to lock up their keys, don't leave them in plain view," he said.

Jidd says the break-ins, coupled with the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic, have made for a stressful year. But he's determined to weather the challenges for his customers and for his nearly 135 employees.

"I'm staying," he said. "We're going to improve security and add armed security.

"They were here for me over the years, I'm going to be there for them," he said.

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