4 die in Chicago hospital shooting
CHICAGO – A gunman opened fire Monday at a Chicago hospital, killing a police officer and two hospital employees after a domestic dispute exploded into a firefight with SWAT team members inside the medical center. The suspect was also dead, authorities said.
It was not immediately clear if the attacker took his own life or was killed by police at Mercy Hospital on the city’s South Side, police said.
“The city of Chicago lost a doctor, pharmaceutical assistant and a police officer, all going about their day, all doing what they loved,” Mayor Rahm Emanuel said, fighting back tears. “This just tears at the soul of our city. It is the face and a consequence of evil.”
A witness named James Gray told reporters that it looked as if the attacker “was turning and shooting people at random.”
The shooting apparently began as the suspect was walking with a woman near a parking lot. He turned and repeatedly shot the woman in the chest. He then entered the hospital and continued firing, Gray said.
The two had been talking to each other in what Gray said did not appear to be a heated exchange.
“Then once she fell to the ground, he stood over her and shot her three more times,” he said.
Earlier, authorities reported that four people were in critical condition, including the officer. At least one of the four was a hospital employee, police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said.
Jennifer Eldridge was working in a hospital pharmacy when she heard three or four shots that seemed to come from outside. Within seconds, she barricaded the door, as called for in the building’s active shooter drills. Then there were six or seven more shots, now much closer, just outside the door.
“I could tell he was now inside the lobby. There was screaming,” she recalled.
The door jiggled, which Eldridge believed was the shooter trying to get in. Some 15 minutes later, a SWAT team officer knocked at the door, came in and led her away. She looked down and saw blood on the floor but no bodies.
Maria Correa hid under a desk, clutching her 4-month-old son, Angel, while the violence unfolded. Correa was in the waiting area of the hospital for her mother-in-law’s doctor appointment when a hospital employee told them to lock themselves in offices.