‘Jitney’ cab driver murdered in South side neighborhood

Adeboye Oguntade, a South side ‘jitney’ cab driver seen here in a photo he uploaded to Facebook in 2010, was shot and killed early April 14
Christopher Becker • Thu, May 03, 2012
A driver for a South side jitney cab company was shot and killed in Englewood while on duty during the early morning hours of Saturday, April 14.

Adegboye Oguntade, 31, was found shot in the back in his car, a 2005 Toyota Carolla according to the police report, after it smashed into a light pole near 69th and Racine. He was taken to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn where he was pronounced dead at 3:43 AM.

Oguntade, from the suburb of Lansing but originally from Nigeria, was driving as an independent contractor for Jet Livery, located near 73rd and Cottage Grove.

“All in all, he was a good kid,” said Fabian Morrison, owner of Jet Livery. “He was a respectful kid, always saying ‘Yes, sir’ to me, every time I saw him it was ‘Yes, sir. He was attending one of the city colleges, I think.”

Oguntade was responding to a call from Jet Livery’s dispatch to pick up a fare on the corner of 62nd and May.

“There were three drivers bidding on that fare, but he got it because he was less than five minutes away, having just dropped someone off at 64th and May,” Morrison said. Morrison said the dispatcher knew there was a problem when Oguntade never made the call to acknowledge he’d arrived at the fare, despite being so close.

Morrison said he believes Oguntade was hi-jacked as soon as he arrived to pick up the fare, since the route from the pick-up to the crash site implied that Oguntade had driven down May Street, which is not a main thoroughfare.

“To a livery driver, time determines the money you make, so a driver wouldn’t take side streets like that. Plus, May has speed humps,” Morrison said. “So that implies to me that the perpetrator told him to take side streets, pulled a gun on him, and he stayed on May.”

Morrison says he believes the shooting began as a hi-jacking, since his company’s drivers have had several cars hi-jacked this year.

As of May 1 police have no suspects in custody. Jennifer Lipford of the BACP said Oguntade did not have his city public chauffeur’s license. In Chicago such unlicensed cabs are commonly known as “jitney” cabs.