CHICAGO — A second man has been charged with participating in an expressway shooting that left a man dead near downtown Chicago last year. An FBI task force arrested Kenneth Campbell, 26, in Las Vegas last month and returned him to Chicago for a bond hearing at the Leighton Criminal Courthouse on Friday.
The events leading up to the shooting began early on September 17, 2022, when a group of five friends arrived in River North for a night out. After parking their two cars, the group began walking toward the Hubbard Street bar district. Along the way, they got into a fight with eight men, including Cambell and 27-year-old Terry Reid, who had just left a nearby bar, prosecutors said.
A 38-year-old woman with the smaller group fired a gun into the air “multiple times” to break up the fight after a 19-year-old man in her party was knocked unconscious. The five friends returned to the Jeep and Nissan that they arrived in and headed toward the expressway.
Surveillance video allegedly showed Reid getting into the driver’s seat of an Audi while holding a gun with a green laser on it. With Campbell in the passenger seat, Reid followed the Jeep and Nissan onto the Ontario feeder ramp.
After Reid maneuvered the Audi through traffic to get next to the Nissan, Campbell opened fire, striking the Nissan twice in the hood, three times in the driver’s door, and once in a tire, which disabled the vehicle, officials said.
Moments later, the Audi pulled up next to the Jeep on the ramp connecting the Dan Ryan and Stevenson Expressways. Reid and Campbell allegedly opened fire on the SUV, killing 24-year-old Kyle Cowart in the front passenger seat. Another occupant of the Jeep suffered a graze wound.
Prosecutors said Cowart also had a gun and fired one round that did not strike anything.
Investigators used surveillance video from Joy District nightclub and cellphone GPS data to identify Reid and Campbell, prosecutors said.
Reid has been held without bail since prosecutors charged him with first-degree murder and four counts of attempted first-degree murder late last month. On Friday, Judge William Fahy held Campbell without bail on the same charges.
Campbell’s defense attorney, Kathryn Lisco, argued that two people who were with the victims fired guns during the incident and it is “quite plausible” that Campbell was acting in self-defense.
Campbell is “heavily involved” in his church, where he serves as an usher, Lisco said, adding that he also works for a foundation in Skokie that encourages an appreciation of the arts by neighborhood youth.