Another murder victim is found shot on a street previously monitored by ShotSpotter

CHICAGO — Chicago police found a man lying dead with gunshot wounds to his chest and back on a West Side street overnight. There had not been calls of shots fired in the area, which was monitored by ShotSpotter gunfire detectors until last week, for over an hour.

A 911 caller reported the man down at 1:52 a.m. in the 4800 block of West Adams. Investigators found about a dozen bullets and an ammunition magazine a few steps from the victim’s body.

Earlier, around 12:35 a.m., a CPD unit and some 911 callers reported hearing shots fired in the neighborhood slightly west of where the still-unidentified man was found. Some witnesses saw a car speeding from the area and a man running down a side street. But it is not known if any of that is related to the man’s death. Had ShotSpotter been active, the system would have provided responding officers with an exact street address and a pin-pointed map showing where the shots were fired.

The man was found one week and two hours after the city’s gunfire detection network was taken offline at the instruction of Mayor Brandon Johnson.

Ald. Jason Ervin (28th) represents the neighborhood where the victim was found. He was one of only 14 aldermen who voted against a last-minute measure that could have kept ShotSpotter active without Johnson’s approval.

He defended his decision by claiming ShotSpotter reduced citizen participation in community safety meetings and caused fewer people to call 911.

Proponents argue that people in some Chicago neighborhoods, all too familiar with the sound of gunfire, don’t call 911 every time they hear shots. ShotSpotter, they said, filled a void.

Tuesday morning’s victim is the second person to be found lying dead of gunshot wounds in areas previously served by ShotSpotter since the system was taken offline.

At about 9:30 a.m. Saturday, a man called 911 to report that a woman had been lying in the same spot in his alley behind the 9500 block of South Avenue N since at least the day before, according to police dispatch records. Responding officers discovered the woman, 19-year-old Sierra Evans, had been fatally shot. Shell casings were lying next to her. But one reported the shots that killed Evans.

More than nine hours before Evans was found, ShotSpotter devices still deployed in the area captured the sounds of gunfire at the murder scene. But, because the city no longer uses the company’s services, police were unaware of the shooting.

About this series

As of 12:01 a.m. on September 23, 2024, Chicago terminated its relationship with ShotSpotter, a gunfire detection system deployed in 12 of the city’s most violence-impacted neighborhoods.

Mayor Brandon Johnson stubbornly refused to reconsider his decision to dismantle ShotSpotter, even though the vast majority of aldermen, many citizens, victim’s advocates, and his handpicked police superintendent requested that it remain in place.

This reporting series, named “Brandon’s Bodies,” seeks to document cases of shooting victims and police investigations that could have benefited from gunshot detection technology.