A 29-year-old man became River North’s first shooting victim of the new year on Wednesday morning — just days after the neighborhood ended 2021 with as many shooting victims as during the two previous years combined.
The victim told police that he was in the back seat of a car parked on a lot in the 200 block of West Ohio when he heard gunfire and realized he had been shot in his calf around 2:30 a.m., according to a CPD statement and a police report. He walked into Northwestern Memorial Hospital more than two hours later for treatment. Police said he is in fair condition.
Court records show the victim was charged with felony unlawful use of a weapon last year after police allegedly found a loaded handgun on his person during a traffic stop in the Loop.
On Sunday, a driver escaped injury when someone shot out his back window as he traveled through the intersection of Dearborn and Kinzie around 3:40 a.m., according to a CPD report.
Officers found surveillance video from a nearby business that showed a Hispanic man wearing a red jacket with red pants firing shots and then fleeing down a ramp that leads to an area under Marina City. No arrests have been announced.
Last year, 23 people were shot in the River North neighborhood, which we define as the area between the Chicago River, Chicago Avenue, and Michigan Avenue. That’s up from 14 shooting victims in 2020 and nine in 2019. CWBChicago maintains independent records of shooting details based on reports from Chicago police and the Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office.
Our records show that charges have been filed in nearly all of the murders reported in River North since 2019.
There were two murders in the area during 2021 — a domestic-related suffocation and the fatal stabbing of a bank employee. Murder charges are ongoing against suspects in both cases.
In 2020, four people were murdered in River North. Charges have been filed in connection with three of them: the intentional striking of a pedestrian by a driver; a shooting on the Wabash Bridge; and a strangulation in a hotel room. A judge sentenced a man to 22-years in prison for the hotel murder in September.
The only unsolved murder in River North from 2020 is the shooting death of a man on the 100 block of West Hubbard during widespread riots and looting on May 30.
Prosecutors have filed charges in both murders reported in River North during 2019: the fatal shooting of a doorman at Sound Bar nightclub and the slaying of off-duty Chicago Police Officer John P. Rivera.
A judge sentenced one man to 65 years in prison for Rivera’s murder last year. Prosecutors are still pursuing murder charges against a second man.
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