By Tony Briscoe and Katherine Rosenberg-Douglas
Chicago Tribune
CHICAGO — Tucked into the third row of a minivan, talking on FaceTime with a friend, Angela Wojcik wasn’t paying much attention to the conversation of her boyfriend and his acquaintances in the front of the vehicle as it sat parked in West Town on Sunday morning.
That was until the percussion of gunfire began shortly before 9 a.m.
“The driver was bleeding from the mouth,” said Wojcik, who lives in the suburbs and spent the previous night out at various clubs in the city. Police later identified the driver as a 26-year-old man who was shot in the lip.
“It was blood over his whole face. It was so surreal,” Wojcik said.
Her boyfriend, 30, was hit twice in the right calf. The front passenger, who police said was a 25-year-old man shot in the left shoulder, appeared to be in the worst condition of the three, Wojcik said.
“No one screamed,” Wojcik said. “But I was FaceTiming with my friend Robert, and he was freaking out.”
All three were taken to Stroger Hospital, where their conditions were stabilized, police said.
It was the second triple shooting of the morning Sunday. The other happened around 6:30 a.m.
Hours later there was another shooting with multiple victims, this one leaving four people wounded at 12:15 p.m. in the 1800 block of West 63rd Street in the Englewood neighborhood. In all, 10 people were wounded in multiple-victim shootings within less than six hours Sunday morning and early Sunday afternoon.
“We’ve had quite a few multiple-victim incidents this weekend,” said Officer Jose Estrada, a Chicago police spokesman. There were six triple shootings from Friday afternoon to early Sunday afternoon, in addition to the quadruple shooting.
The most seriously injured in the Englewood shooting was a 26-year-old man who suffered a gunshot wound to the right eye and was taken by a family member to St. Bernard Hospital before being transferred to Stroger Hospital in critical condition, police said.
The others wounded were: Another 26-year-old man, shot in the right buttocks and left foot; a 56-year-old woman, shot multiple times in the left leg; and a 48-year-old woman shot in the right hip. All three were taken to Advocate Christ Medical Center, where their conditions were stabilized.
The four were in a convenience store when they heard gunshots and ran outside, where four armed men or boys shot them, police said. The four attackers got into a white sedan and fled the scene. No one was in custody.
In the first of the three multiple-victim attacks, three people were shot about 6:30 a.m. Sunday in the 3500 block of South Calumet Avenue in the Ida B. Wells/Darrow Homes neighborhood, according to police, correcting earlier information that the shooting happened on Rhodes Avenue. A 22-year-old man was shot in the left leg and was taken by a friend to Mercy Hospital. He was later transferred to Stroger Hospital, where his condition was stabilized.
A 24-year-old man was shot in the left leg, and his condition was stabilized at Northwestern Memorial Hospital. A 23-year-old woman was shot in the leg, and her condition was stabilized at Northwestern Memorial Hospital.
The victims weren’t being cooperative, and police had no narrative information on the shooting.
Other shootings:
About 9:30 p.m., a 16-year-old boy was shot in Bridgeport. A friend took him to Mercy Hospital and Medical Center with a gunshot wound to the calf, and he told investigators he had been shot in the 2800 block of South Hillock Avenue. The boy’s condition was stabilized.
Earlier in an attack that only injured one victim, a man was shot while driving along the 1100 block of North Lockwood Avenue about 11 a.m., police said.
He was traveling north on Lockwood in a 2014 Ford Escape when someone opened fire on his vehicle. He was shot in his left shoulder, arm and ear before crashing his vehicle in the same block, causing his SUV to overturn. He was taken to Stroger, where he was listed in stable condition, officials said. No one has been arrested in connection with the shooting and authorities continue to investigate.
The shootings come as part of a particularly violent weekend in Chicago, with 29 people shot, three fatally, in a 24-hour period from Saturday to Sunday. From Friday to Saturday, one person was killed and 14 were wounded in shootings across the city.
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