CHICAGO — Video has surfaced of an altercation that ended with a 16-year-old girl fatally stabbed in downtown Chicago on Tuesday night.
Chicago police released a statement on Thursday announcing murder charges against an 18-year-old woman in connection with the case, but the department quickly retracted the statement and said the investigation was ongoing.
As of Friday morning, no charges have been filed against the woman in the Cook County court clerk’s system.
In the video, which began circulating on social media Thursday, a group of men and women are seen sitting and standing along a low concrete wall at the intersection of Van Buren and Federal in the Loop around 11:28 p.m.
An argument between some of the people grows louder and louder as tensions rise. Eventually, some people involved in the altercation move to the street.
While the stabbing is not seen in the video, which is shared below, onlookers are heard reacting.
“Ooooooh!”
“Ooo!”
“Damn!”
The camera rises to show a woman wearing a tank top running down the street. She collapses in the road near the crosswalk at Federal and Van Buren.
“Oh my f***ing God!” A man yells.
Other videos shared online show onlookers gathering around the fallen woman as several people comfort and try to help her.
She didn’t make it.
The Cook County medical examiner’s office identified the murdered teenager as Heaven Taylor of the 8200 block of South Drexel.
Police said a woman stabbed Taylor twice in the chest.
While CPD said in an initial media statement that the attacker was unknown, a source offered conflicting information, saying she is well-known to officers in the Central (1st) Police District.
The woman that police erroneously said had been charged with the murder is the same woman that police began looking for immediately after the stabbing, multiple sources confirmed.
Shortly before the stabbing, workers at Taco Bell, 415 South Dearborn, called 911 to report up to a dozen people, some armed, pounding on the restaurant’s windows and threatening to attack an employee.
A witness flagged down police officers responding to the Taco Bell call to assist Taylor.
The group that threatened the Taco Bell employees may be linked to the large group that beat and stabbed two people in the Loop on Saturday morning.
In a brief media statement over the weekend, CPD stated that the offenders stabbed a 29-year-old woman and a man of unknown age during an altercation in the 800 block of South Plymouth Court at around 4:11 a.m.
CWBChicago reported on Saturday that officers at the scene said about eight people known to hang out near the Harold Washington Library and a nearby Red Line station are responsible for the attack, but no arrests had been made.
The woman was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where she underwent surgery for stab wounds on her head and neck. The nature of the man’s injuries is unknown, but CPD said both victims were in critical condition.
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