A man who police say shot another man in a Rogers Park alley last year has finally been charged with murder, more than a year after Chicago police detained him just 30 minutes after the killing.
Detectives arrested 32-year-old Valgas Etheard this week as he was being discharged from the downstate Lincoln Correctional Center, where he had been serving time for two felony counts of driving on a suspended license, according to state records.
Chicago police said Etheard has been identified as the gunman who fatally shot 31-year-old Terrell Fort in an alley behind the 2000 block of West Howard Street around 5:45 p.m. on September 5, 2024. Witnesses told police they saw a man calmly walking out of the alley moments after hearing gunfire.
Responding officers found Fort dead with a gunshot wound to the back of his head.
As CWBChicago previously reported, about 30 minutes after the murder, Evanston police spotted a man matching the suspect’s description in the 7500 block of North Damen Avenue. Chicago police detained him for investigation on an outstanding warrant. We can now reveal that the person detained that evening was Etheard. No charges were filed at the time, but detectives continued their investigation.
Etheard is expected to appear at the Leighton Criminal Courthouse for a detention hearing Saturday afternoon, when prosecutors will outline their evidence in the case.
Before his latest trip to prison, Etheard had been sentenced to the penitentiary four other times: for gun-related crimes in 2012, 2015, and 2016, and for a narcotics offense in 2020.
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