Feb. 27--The younger brother of a cabbie slain on the North Side said Friday that he feels sorry for the man charged with killing his older brother for his cash and cellphone.
"I feel sorry for that kid. He's only 19 years old," said Shams Shamji, 36. "What can I say? No conscience before taking somebody's life. Where are we heading?"
Kamil Shamji, 58, was found slumped over the steering wheel of his Flash Cab around 8 a.m. Monday behind Sulzer Regional Library in the Lincoln Square neighborhood, according to police.
Police say Lamon Weathers, 19, had called for a cab at a McDonald's at 6740 N. Clark St. on Sunday evening and Shamji picked him up about 10:50 p.m. A camera inside the cab shows Shamji taking Weathers to the library and Weathers shooting him, according to Area North police Cmdr. Kevin Duffin.
"The video is fairly shocking," Duffin said at a news conference Friday morning. "The driver turns and obviously tells him what the fare is. He begins to pull out money. And the driver turns his head back. And (Weathers) puts the money back, pulls the gun out and shoots him like instantaneously."
The cab rolled forward and came to a stop at the curb, authorities said. Police discovered a tablet computer and a cellphone were missing. Duffin did not know how much money Weathers also got away with, but the cabdriver's co-workers say Shamji usually carried about $200 to make change.
Weathers also took the cab's camera but "he didn't realize the flash drive, or SIM card, was still there. So once we downloaded that, the entire cab ride itself, as well as the actual murder, was caught," Duffin said.
Investigators found a pack of Newports in the backseat with a fingerprint that was traced to Weathers, who has an arrest record for trespassing and domestic battery, Duffin said.
Police tracked Weathers' phone to the Joliet area. Detectives went there and saw him trying to board Metra train that was leaving, Duffin said. He was arrested at the station and a .32-caliber handgun was found on him, he said.
"Initial processing indicates that that, in fact, was the weapon used to kill our victim," Duffin said.
Weathers was still wearing a distinctive black jacket with multiple zippers and a hood that he was wearing at the McDonald's, where a surveillance camera had captured him, authorities said.
Detectives were assisted by a CTA security agent who gave them video of the suspect on the Red Line "L" at the Loyola Avenue station before the slaying. After the slaying, he was on the Brown Line and a few buses, including one on the Roosevelt Road route, Duffin said.
Weathers, of the 2000 block of West Arthur Avenue on the Far North Side, was charged with first-degree murder and ordered held without bond during a hearing Friday afternoon.
"You pose a threat and a danger to everyone in his city who goes out and walks around," Judge Adam Bourgeois Jr. said.
Weathers turned to face the courtroom spectators as he was led out by sheriff's deputies. "All y'all have a nice day," he said. "Drive safe. Bless y'all."
Weathers completed the 11th grade and has a 2-year-old daughter who lives with her mother in Florida, his public defender Margaret Domin said. He was living in a Geneva Foundation youth home and studying for his GED, she said. He has been a ward of the state for the last two years, she said.
Assistant State's Attorney Jamie Santini said Weathers had juvenile convictions including in 2009 for making a false report and domestic battery and in 2010 for destroying evidence and aggravated battery to an official. He spent 18 months in the juvenile jail on those charges, he said.
Court records show Weathers has seven arrests since last April for allegedly punching a roommate in the head, riding in stolen cars and damaging windows and furniture in two different youth homes.
Cook County Judge Diana Kenworthy, who was hearing his domestic battery case, found in May that Weathers was bipolar, records show. He appeared "irrational" at a police lockup that same month after being arrested for throwing chairs, two window screens and a couple of plates at a Geneva Foundation home, records show.
That misdemeanor criminal damage case was later dismissed, as were all but two of the other criminal cases brought against him last year. He pleaded guilty to criminal damage to property in December was sentenced to 6 months of court supervision for throwing a rock through the window of a Thresholds group home and running away, records show.
Two days after pleading guilty, Weathers was found driving a stolen car in the Belmont-Cragin neighborhood -- the second time last year he was arrested driving a stolen car, records show. That misdemeanor criminal trespass case is still pending.
The night before the robbery, Shamji and his younger brother spent time together at a friend's place, Shams Shamji said. He said his brother hugged him and appeared "very relaxed."
Kamil Shamji was from Pakistan and had been a cabdriver in Chicago for 35 years, according to his friends. He had worked for Flash Cab the last 20 years.
Friends said he had been working long hours, as much as 20 hours at a stretch, to help one of his two daughters get through school.
Shams Shamji described his older brother as a "very good-hearted person" who was like a father to him. He had heard stories from people about his older brother enjoying his life. "He would walk out of a bar with five girls right behind him," he joked.
It wasn't until the early 2000s that the two first got to know each other. Around 2011, they lived together for about seven months in the Rogers Park neighborhood.
Kamil Shamji was diabetic but loved to eat, Shams Shamji said. The two often dined at an Indian and Pakistani restaurant in the neighborhood along Devon Avenue. The two would go there late into the night, sometimes about 3 a.m. when Kamil Shamji would finish his shift.
