Gunfire erupted outside of a South Side high school Friday, leaving one man dead and another wounded, hours before one of the school’s graduations was scheduled to begin.
Gunfire erupted outside of a South Side high school Friday, leaving one man dead and another wounded, hours before one of the school’s graduations was scheduled to begin. Two 19-year-old men were sitting in a vehicle facing southbound in front of the school around 12:30 p.m. after they dropped off a female student who attends one of the four schools housed inside DuSable Leadership Academy High School on 49th Street and Wabash Avenue. As they waited outside, a gunman walked up and opened fire, police said. The passenger was killed, and the driver ran away. The gunman then chased the driver who ran into the school for assistance. The gunman ran into a vacant lot across the street from the school and into a parked four-door gray or silver vehicle with a sunroof, said Chicago Police spokesman Roderick Drew. Monique Bond, spokesperson for Chicago Public Schools, said neither victim was a student at the school. The driver of the vehicle was taken to Stroger Hospital in an unknown condition, Drew said. He explained that shell casings have been recovered, and police are canvassing the area and checking whether police cameras in the area captured the shooting. While a motive hasn’t been determined, it appears to be gang-related, he said. The shooter is described as a Black male between the ages of 16 and 18, between 5 feet 6 inches and 5 feet 9 inches tall, and wearing a dark hoodie and dark jeans. “He gets in a car and drives away. This is not the Wild, Wild West. This is Chicago, Illinois. We’ve got to get some sort of peace back to the streets here,” said Police Supt. Jody Weis. A witness to the shooting narrowly escaped death as her vehicle was near the royal blue Dodge Charger the victims were sitting in.
Gladys, who withheld her last name, was waiting for her granddaughter who attends the school when she saw a boy approach the victims and say, “I’m gone shoot you m—–f—–s.” At that point, the shooter pulled out a black gun, which was described by the witness as possibly a .45 caliber pistol, and cocked it. “It didn’t go off when he cocked it the first time. He did it again and the boys in the car just looked at him. He cocked it a third time and still nothing happened. The boy then pulled out the clip, put it back in and started firing,” Gladys said. At that point, a bullet came through her windshield and exited the back window while she was sitting in her vehicle. She ducked and managed to get out of her car to seek refuge elsewhere. “I just don’t understand why they would continue to sit in the car and watch him try to shoot them,” Gladys said as she waited for the police to release her vehicle. Shanique, an 8th-grade student at Williams school inside DuSable said she was “terrified.” “I couldn’t have imagined anything like this happening. I am very scared,” she said. Kimberlyn McMorris, a parent of a freshman at the school, said she was shocked when her daughter called her about the incident. “When I answered the phone, she said, ‘You need to come get me now,’” McMorris said. Once she arrived, while the shooting was tragic, she was relieved to know it wasn’t a school incident. Alderman Pat Dowell (3rd), whose ward DuSable sets in, said she was saddened by the shooting and hopes the residents of the ward will work with the police to find the killer. “We’ve got to figure out a way to get young people to not be attracted to the lifestyle of gang life. It’s ravaging our youth,” Dowell said, referring to the possibility of the motive being gang-related. No one is in custody, police said. ______ In main photo: An unidentified woman looks at a bullet hole in her car window at the scene of a shooting near DuSable High School Friday afternoon.
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