Gun violence in Chicago neighborhoods

Children playing basketball in a schoolyard suddenly scatter. Because it begins to rain or was time to go home? Yes, in most neighborhoods that’s why children run with purpose. In parts of Chicago, children run from gunfire. They know the sound. They know they should duck. Kanari Gentry Bowers, 12 years old, is in a West Englewood elementary schoolyard with classmates early Saturday evening when they hear shots. Kanari knows to duck, her uncle says, but the kids scatter. Kanari is struck in the head by a bullet.

A half-hour later, members of a family sit in a parked minivan while running an early Saturday evening errand. Nothing could be less remarkable. But it’s the Parkway Gardens neighborhood. There is gunfire. The mom in the vehicle asks: Is everyone OK? There is no answer from 11-year-old Takiya Holmes in the back seat. She’s been hit in the head by a bullet.

Two preteen girls shot in the head in Chicago on a Saturday evening, 4 miles apart in South Side neighborhoods. The horror isn’t easy to process. How does this happen? What are the odds? But there is no simple explanation, no pattern behind the coincidence of these sep- arate tragedies. There is, however, an epidemic of gun violence in Chicago neighborhoods that fells victims of every age.

The numbers: Last year was the city’s bloodiest year for violence in two decades. Chicago had 762 homicides and 4,367 shootings. Of those shot, 76 were children younger than 15 — three of them fatally — according to Tribune data. This year, so far, shootings are up 8 percent and homicides down 20 percent; nine children younger than 15 have been shot.

Much of the city’s gun violence in neighborhoods on the South and West sides traces to gangs and drugs.