Armed Man Arrested Outside Notre Dame College Prep Held Without Bond

SKOKIE, IL — A Chicago man was ordered held without bond after allegedly admitting that he illegally carried a gun outside a high school in Niles.

Carlos Ablert Kamber, 51, of the 5700 block of West Giddings Street, has been charged with armed habitual criminal and two counts of misdemeanor aggravated assault in connection with his arrest Thursday in front of Notre Dame College Prep , 7655 Dempster St., records show.

According to police and prosecutors, shortly before 9 a.m. dispatchers received a 911 call that someone had lifted up his shirt to flash a handgun tucked into his pants. At the time, school was in session and students were arriving.

Officers immediately notified school staff, who ensured "no one was to enter or leave the school," according to a police spokesperson. School officials said they were appreciative of the swift work by police.

"Once we were alerted by Niles Police, we were able to put our safety plan into motion and continue to provide a safe school and campus," a school spokesperson told Patch. "At no time was there any specific threat to our school community."

Police reported they found Kamber at the Pace bus stop at the corner of Dempster Street and Oriole Avenue. He match the description of the gunman and admitted having a gun.

"Officers asked [Kamber] if he possessed a firearm and [Kamber] stated that he did," Cook County Assistant State's Attorney Kate Fritzmann said Friday at Kamber's initial court appearance in Skokie.

Kamber told officers the 911 caller, the driver of a black Jeep, had "looked at him angrily," Fritzmann said. "[Kamber] further stated he then lifted his shirt and displayed the handgun."

The prosecutor said Kamber told investigators that he had the gun for protection and had been in the area to visit his son.

Kamber has six past felony convictions, and at the time of his arrest he was on supervised release stemming from a 2011 conviction on federal charges in Southern Illinois. He received a 20½ year prison sentence in that case and was released in February 2020.

Records show he pleaded guilty to conspiracy to manufacture and distribute more than 1,000 marijuana plans, manufacture of more than 1,000 marijuana plants, possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking offense, felon in possession of a firearm and unlawful alien in possession of a firearm in connection with a June 2009 arrest.

According to a Department of Homeland Security immigration detainer Kamber filed as a court exhibit while acting as his own attorney, he was released from Immigration and Custom Enforcement custody in Chicago in March 2005 on an order of supervision pending getting travel documents to return to his native Iraq.

After Kamber served time for a 2008 conviction in Cook County for possession of a controlled substance, U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents found him during a court-authorized search of a home in rural Elizabethtown. Agents reported finding more than 1,000 marijuana plants in the home and a nearby building, as well as two guns.

According to the ICE report, Kamber said he had been sent to the home by gang members who had planned on killing him. He claimed they had kept him alive and made him work as a security guard because he had incriminating information.

During a June 2009 interview with a federal agent, Kamber reportedly said he had been affiliated with the Latin Kings and Assyrian Kings street gangs.

"Kamber stated he later had a falling out with the Assyrian Kings because he began practicing Judaism," the agent reported. "Kamber stated he is currently being threatened by members of both the Latin Kings and Assyrian Kings as they have now joined forces."

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Armed habitual criminal, the most series charge Kamber currently faces, is a class X felony that carries a minimum prison sentence of six years.

Fritzmann said federal authorities plan to file paperwork to revoke Kamber's supervision as a result of his arrest in Niles. The prosecutor argued that Kamber posed a real and present threat to the person at whom he flashed the gun as well as the community at large.

After Cook County Circuit Judge Aleksandra Gillespie granted the prosecution's request that he be held without bail, Kamber said his cooperation with federal authorities had put his life at risk. He said government officials were aware that "gangbangers" were trying to kill him — and that he had been shot and nearly killed.

"I tried to make everybody aware of this, everybody in the federal government, that they threw me out in the streets and have me as a victim," Kamber said.

"Why? Because I went into a proffer with the government like that," he said. "This is the reason why I'm here. I've been screaming out for help. Everybody's been trying to kill me. These gang members have been trying to kill me."