Dominick Harvey, 43, of west suburban Berwyn faces two separate counts of residential burglary.
Harvey is accused of entering two homes in Riverside and stealing cash, jewelry and computer equipment. Police recovered one of those computers and discovered Harvey had saved a partial picture of himself on the hard drive.
Police say he has confessed to the crimes. Harvey is already on parole for a separate burglary conviction.
One of the items taken, an Apple Macbook Pro laptop, was recovered by police, who found the suspect's photo saved on it. Leads from the community led to Harvey's identification and apprehension.
Riverside Police Chief Tom Weitzel said, "This arrest was a prime example of the community, local businesses and police tactical units working together to apprehend this offender. Immediately after the photo was made public, we had several leads in the case. We had him identified 15 minutes after his photo was made public."
Riverside police had been searching for Harvey for several weeks as he was moving frequently to avoid arrest. In a statement, he told investigators he saw his photo in the news and was aware police were hunting for him, a police news release said.
The Sun-Times Media Wire contributed to this report.
