It took Chicago police officers almost 14 minutes to find a man who got shot in the chest during an argument in Gresham early Wednesday, CPD dispatch audio reveals. The victim struggled to tell a 911 operator exactly where he was located, and officers employed various techniques to find him.

Their task would have been made a lot easier had Mayor Brandon Johnson not disconnected the city’s ShotSpotter network last September.

The victim called 911 shortly after 5 a.m., saying he had been shot in the stomach near 78th Street and Ashland Avenue. But he didn’t know exactly where he was, telling a 911 operator that he was on the first floor of a back porch opposite a currency exchange.

As the police continued the hunt, he told the 911 call taker that he heard a dog barking and thought he might be near 78th and Laflin.

Officers activated their blue lights to increase visibility and scoured the area. It wasn’t until the man mustered a scream at 5:23 a.m. that an officer heard him, leading police to a porch in the 1500 block of West 78th Street. By then, nearly 14 minutes had passed since the police were first dispatched. At the scene, cops recovered a box of ammunition and a phone possibly belonging to the shooter.

Local Alderman David Moore (17th), a vocal supporter of ShotSpotter, joined a City Council supermajority last year urging Johnson to renew the company’s contract, but the mayor dismantled it anyway.

The following unedited clip of CPD radio traffic captures the nearly 14-minute search, from the initial 911 dispatch to the officer’s report that they had likely found the victim. The fact that virtually no one has 14 minutes to spare for listening to the recording highlights just how long the wait was.

Brandon’s Bodies

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, despite the vast majority of aldermen, many citizens, victim advocates, and his handpicked police superintendent requesting 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.

The general criteria for inclusion are a gunshot victim found outside in a location previously served by ShotSpotter with either (1) no accompanying 911 calls about gunfire or (2) calls about gunfire in a general area that did not lead to the timely location of the victim.

Editor’s note: The case previously included as #13 on this list has been removed as of May 21, 2025, because the Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office investigation determined the individual died by suicide in a fall from height.