5 gunned down in Chicago violence

CHICAGO. - It was a torrid pace on a torrid night, even for a city notorious for its gun violence. In a span of less than three hours, 30 people were shot in Chicago USA), an average of one every five minutes or so.

Rates of violent crime have actually been falling in the city recently, but one wouldn’t know it from the police calls during the early hours of Sunday, a steamy night sandwiched between 35 degrees Celcius (95-degree Fahrenheit) days.

Outside Stroger Hospital on Sunday morning, several dozen people gathered to wait for updates on their wounded loved ones. “You could just feel the grief,” said Eric Russell, a community activist who visited the families there. “You had people crying and just laying down on concrete.”

The terse, jargonish police log entries, summarised below, reflect some stark realities about Chicago’s crime plague. Twenty-eight of the 30 victims were black; the other two were Hispanic. Eleven were minors.

The most intense burst of violence began just after midnight.

12:02am. - Two men in a passing white Impala fire shots into the crowd at a block party, hitting a 13-year-old boy twice in the arm, a 16-year-old boy in the buttocks, and a 25-year-old man in the leg; a 17-year-old girl is grazed in the arm and knee. Four wounded.

12:05 am. - Shots fired from another vehicle hit a 20-year-old woman in the stomach as she is driving on West Altgeld Street. One wounded.

12:23am. - An 18-year-old man suffers several gunshot wounds to the body; the police officers who respond to the scene are not able to learn the circumstances. One wounded.

12:39am. - Several men approach a group of people standing in a courtyard on West 76th Street and open fire. A 17-year-old girl; a 19-year-old man; a 21-year-old woman are each hit in the leg. Another 17-year-old girl is hit in the knee; an 18-year-old man is hit in the buttocks; a 19-year-old woman and a 14-year-old girl are hit in the hand. A 35-year-old man is grazed in the head. Eight wounded.

12:50 a.m. - A brief gun battle erupts on North Karlov Avenue. Two people in a black Cadillac shoot and wound three people on the street: a 30-year-old woman in the calf; a 30-year-old man in the calf and ankle; and, a 29-year-old man in the chest. Return fire caused the car to crash; the occupants fled on foot. A 43-year-old man walking down the street was caught in the crossfire and hit in the thigh. Four wounded.

1:03 a.m. - A 26-year-old man walking with another man is hit twice by shots fired from a white Jeep. The man is taken to a hospital in critical condition and dies there. The Jeep is found abandoned and on fire five blocks from the shooting scene. One killed.

1:30am. - A 26-year-old man standing on the sidewalk is hit in the leg by shots fired from a white sedan. He goes to the UIC Medical Centre on his own for treatment. One wounded.

2:26am. - Women standing on a front porch are caught in the crossfire when two groups of men begin shooting at each other: a 29-year-old woman is hit in the back; a 28-year-old in the arm; and a 41-year-old in the thigh. Three wounded.

2:34am. - Two men approach a group of young people standing on the sidewalk and open fire. A 17-yearold girl is shot in the face and is pronounced dead at the scene. Three boys, 11, 14 and 17, are each hit in the leg;

another 17-year-old girl is hit in the arm, and a 21-year-old woman is hit in the back and arm. One killed, five wounded.

2:50 a.m. - A 14-year-old boy suffers a gunshot wound to the leg. He tells police that he heard shots and felt one hit him but did not know where they came from. One wounded.

According to an AFP report, violence in the Midwestern city often spikes in the summer months, when the warm weather means more people are outside.

Fred Waller, a Chicago Police Department commander, said there were a number of outdoor events over the weekend that were vulnerable to gang-related revenge attacks.

“What we have are multiple areas with crowds,” Waller said.

“They take advantage of that opportunity.”

The latest spasm of bloodshed occurred at the same time as the famed Lollapalooza music festival was taking over a large swath of the city’s downtown, requiring a heavy police presence.

The festival was not affected by the violence, Waller said. The shootings surged in the early morning hours, well after the end of the festival’s daily schedule of performances.

Chicago’s gun violence has been the subject of two high-profile protests this summer, in which demonstrators temporarily blocked major expressways to call attention to their demands for more investment in poor communities.

Federal authorities have increased their efforts in the city, creating a special task force in cooperation with local police to target those who repeatedly commit gun crimes. - New York Times/AFP.