At least 18 people were shot and two killed in about a dozen separate shooting incidents across Chicago over the past weekend, said the Chicago Police Department in a Monday update.
A man was shot and killed by Chicago police on Sunday after he allegedly fired at officers, critically wounding two people in a hostage situation near the Ford City Mall on the Southwest Side, officials told NBC5, citing police spokesman Tom Ahern.
In another incident, a 16-year-old boy was critically wounded on Saturday at 3 p.m. in the 800 block of East 54th Street in Hyde Park when someone shot him in the chest. The teen was taken to Comer Children’s Hospital and is currently in critical condition, officials said.
On Saturday evening, a 31-year-old man was shot while in a vehicle traveling on the Dan Ryan Expressway near 71st Street, according to the Illinois State Police. He was taken to a nearby hospital for non-life-threatening injuries, police said.
Authorities said that about a dozen more people were shot and wounded across the city from 6 p.m. local time on Friday, April 1, to 11:59 p.m. on Sunday, April 3.
Local media reported that at least three people were killed and another 14 were wounded in shooting incidents in Chicago last weekend.
However, the data suggests that property crimes are up significantly in 2022 as compared with the previous year. For example, there have been 3,076 motor vehicle thefts reported so far this year, as compared with 2,048 during the same time period in 2021, the data shows.
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, a Democrat, recently proclaimed that the reason why carjackings are higher is due to an increased number of “unloved” young people in the city. “There are too many young people in this room that feel unloved, and we need to change that if we are going to change the trajectory of their lives,” Lightfoot said, without elaborating, during an event last week.
