CHICAGO — At least five people were killed and 33 others were wounded in Chicago shootings the weekend before Christmas in a sharp spike of gun violence compared to earlier this month.
Shootings happened on blocks as far north as the Rogers Park neighborhood, as far south as the Fernwood neighborhood and as far west as the Austin neighborhood. No shootings were reported downtown or on the Near North Side. The most violent area was the Englewood district, which saw 15 people shot this weekend — nearly all from a single shooting incident. Ages of gunshot victims citywide ranged from a 15-year-old boy who was wounded to a 55-year-old man who was killed.
The toll was more than double last weekend’s, when 16 people were shot, two of them fatally.
Though Chicago is poised to end its third consecutive year with double-digit declines — through mid-December, homicides fell almost 14 percent while the total number of people shot dropped nearly 11 percent — the weekend led to renewed pledges from politicians to tackle the city’s gun violence after 13 people were shot, four critically, at an Englewood memorial party.
“We can’t normalize this kind of behavior and tragedy in this city,” Mayor Lori Lightfoot told reporters Sunday afternoon outside University of Chicago Medical Center, adding, “Solving disputes with a gun is never the right answer.”
The violence began about 12:40 a.m. Sunday at a house party commemorating the birthday of a man who died in a previous shooting. Someone at the party opened fire seemingly randomly, injuring people ages 16 to 48, according to Fred Waller, who heads the patrol division for Chicago police.
Those wounded were one 16-year-old boy, eight men and four women. As of Sunday afternoon, two of the men remained in critical condition, police said.
It was the largest single shooting in the city since 2013, when 13 people were wounded Sept. 13 at Cornell Square Park in the Back of the Yards neighborhood.
The most recent fatal shooting this weekend claimed the life of a 37-year-old man who was standing at a gas station in the Homan Square neighborhood when two gunmen fired at him about 9 p.m. Sunday. He was pronounced dead at Mount Sinai Hospital, and a suspect was arrested following a police chase.
Saturday afternoon, a 41-year-old man was killed in a shooting in the Chicago Lawn neighborhood. About 2:18 p.m., he was standing on a corner in the 6000 block of South Fairfield Avenue when someone fired a handgun about 2:20 p.m. He died from gunshot wounds at Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, police said.
