It’s been a year since a gunman shot two men to death in separate random attacks in the Rogers Park neighborhood. And Chicago police today essentially said the case has gone cold.
“I’m saddened to report that we’ve exhausted all our active and actionable leads,” Area North Detectives Commander Robert Cesario said at a press conference on Tuesday afternoon. “We want to generate more tips.”
Cesario said a $150,000 reward is being offered for information leading to the killer’s arrest.
“Someone has information,” he said. “We’re asking that they come forward with that information and contact police.”
CPD also re-released video and surveillance images that show the killer approaching 73-year-old Douglass Watts on the 1400 block of West Sherwin at 10:07 on Sept. 30, 2018. Other previously-released footage showed the killer running from the murder scene through a nearby alley. No new images or videos were included in Tuesday’s release.
The day after Watts was shot at point-blank range while walking his dog, Eliyahu Moscowitz was killed with a single gunshot to his head as he walked on a bike path in Loyola Park around 10:20 p.m.
Moscowitz was killed almost directly under a police department surveillance camera, but authorities have said the lens was pointing in the wrong direction and it did not record any images of the killing or the murderer. In fact, police have not issued any images connected to the Moscowitz murder at all.
Anthony Guglielmi, the police department’s chief spokesperson, encouraged the public to share information with investigators anonymously via cpdtip.com
Tips may also be phoned in to Area North detectives at 312-744-8261.
Ballistics testing revealed that the gun used to kill Watts and Moscowitz was used again two weeks later in a double-shooting on the West Side. The same gun was fired at a group of security guards on the Near West Side in late March. No one was injured in the latter incident.
See all of CWBChicago’s Rogers Park murder coverage here.
