A Chicago man has been sentenced to 40 years in prison after pleading guilty to two Northwest Side murders he committed within days of each other in December 2021, cases that were solved after police found the murder weapon in a carjacked vehicle he was driving.
Hader Garcia, 22, pleaded guilty to both killings in exchange for the sentence issued by Judge Peggy Chiampas, court records show. Under Illinois law, he must serve 100% of his sentence.
Garcia’s case began to unravel on January 7, 2022, when police detained him while driving a newly stolen SUV. Because the victim was unable to identify Garcia as one of the people who stole the vehicle, prosecutors charged him with possessing a stolen motor vehicle.
But what officers discovered inside the SUV ultimately linked Garcia to two murders that occurred barely a week apart: a 9mm handgun with a “Supreme” sticker on the magazine.
The first murder took place about 3 a.m. on December 18, 2021, on the 4700 block of West Irving Park Road. According to prosecutors, 36-year-old Richard Robinette, a handyman who also worked as a beer vendor at Soldier Field, was stopped at a red light when Garcia came up beside him in a stolen Acura SUV.
Garcia fired six shots into Robinette’s vehicle, hitting him many times. Robinette’s car rolled forward and crashed into parked vehicles. He died a short while afterward. Witnesses who were stopped behind Robinette remained at the scene and spoke with police as the Acura fled.
Investigators tracked down the stolen Acura in Skokie using security footage and license plate reader equipment. There, video recorded about five hours after the shooting showed Garcia getting out of the driver’s seat and placing a handgun in the front of his pants.
A Skokie police officer recognized Garcia from previous contacts, according to prosecutors, and detectives discovered a round casing from the Acura’s driver-side floorboard that matched six shell casings seized at the murder site.
The case took a major turn when Garcia was arrested weeks later while driving a stolen SUV. Police discovered three weapons in the truck, including one with an olive-green extended magazine with a “Supreme” badge. Ballistics testing later determined that the gun was used to kill Robinette, prosecutors alleged.
Investigators also found photos and videos on Garcia’s cellphone showing him holding a handgun with the same distinctive magazine. Prosecutors claimed the photographs showed Garcia wearing the same outfit seen in surveillance footage taken hours after Robinette’s murder. GPS data from the phone allegedly placed Garcia near the shooting scene when Robinette was killed, too.
A few months after Garcia was charged with Robinette’s murder, a grand jury indicted him in the December 11, 2021, killing of Victor Gutierrez in the 3700 block of West Belle Plaine Avenue. Prosecutors claimed Garcia fired multiple rounds from an SUV, wounding Gutierrez in the head.
Once again, ballistics evidence led to the “Supreme” pistol discovered at Garcia’s January 2022 arrest. Additional evidence, including surveillance video and social media posts, helped detectives link Garcia to both the gun and the shooting, prosecutors said.
While awaiting trial in the murder charges, federal authorities indicted Garcia, along with ten other alleged La Familia Stones street gang members, in a significant crack cocaine distribution case. Garcia pleaded guilty in that case in 2024 and received a 37-month federal prison sentence, according to court records.
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