Friends and family are sharing memories online of Cordaryl Allen, the 35-year-old man who was shot to death at the J. Parker lounge atop Hotel Lincoln, 1816 North Clark, over the weekend.
Chicago police have not announced any arrests. The medical examiner’s office said Allen, a father of three, died from a gunshot wound to his back.
As of Wednesday evening, a Chicago police spokesperson said the department had not issued a summary closure notice against the bar. CPD has routinely exercised its “summary closure” powers against other nightclubs where shootings have occurred.
“You did this to my kids and they are going Krazy now that everyone left the house y’all [expletive] wrong MANNNNNN💔💔😔😔 they daddy gone and I don’t have my husband 💔💔💔💔💔💔 ughhhhhh,” Allen’s wife wrote on Facebook earlier this week.
“Life without my Husband I don’t even understand it.”
“This is such a sad occasion,” writes his sister, CeCe, in a GoFundMe campaign. “We’ve lost a brother, uncle, cousin, son and for some a best friend. But most importantly a loving husband and a good father.”
“He was always laughing, or saying something funny. We’re going to truly miss him. I know everyone he met loved him and just know he loved you all too.”
CeCe’s campaign had raised almost $2,100 of its $7,500 goal by Wednesday evening.
“It don’t sit right knowing who and how he was to this world,” a friend remembered on Facebook.
“I can’t even think straight,” friend Matthew Damion Taylor wrote on Facebook, remembering Allen as a “straight family man about his wife, kids, work, and the Bears.”
Investigation ongoing
Witnesses said the man who killed Allen fled onto Clark Street and headed south after the shooting. An officer who reviewed surveillance footage said the gunman was a Black male who wore a tan hoodie with cutoff sleeves. It had a design on the front, and he had the hood cinched around his face. The suspect also wore dark jeans and a red belt that appeared to be embedded with red stones, the officer said.
A guest of the Hotel Lincoln told ABC7 Chicago that a J. Parker employee ran into his guest room after the shooting.
“He’s like stiff bodied. And I’m like, ‘Man, what’s going on? And he’s like, ‘Someone just got shot upstairs. Can I just come in and hang out?” the man told the TV station.
“He said he heard someone arguing over water bottles or something like that.”
The J. Parker website said the venue would re-open on Tuesday but later updated to say it would be closed that night, too. On Wednesday, the site said the lounge was closed for a private event and would re-open Thursday, October 20.