Charles Nelson had just gotten out the door on his way to a concert in Millennium Park Monday afternoon when gunfire exploded up his South Side block. The 71-year-old got down to the ground and waited through what he estimated was a full minute of shooting.
“Please call 911,” he texted his neighbors. “Over 30 gunshots.”
When Nelson got up again, almost 40 shell casings lay in the street.
Five people were injured, one seriously, in the Bronzeville neighborhood in the Monday afternoon shooting, authorities said.
Police officers responded to a call of a person shot at the 700 block of East 43rd Street just before 3:30 p.m. and found five victims had been struck by gunfire, Chicago police said. A woman in her 60s was shot in the leg and transported to UChicago Medicine in serious condition, according to a preliminary police notification.
Four others were injured in the shooting, including a 35-year-old man who was shot in the arm, a 39-year-old man who was shot in the arm, a 44-year-old man who was shot in the foot and a 72-year-old woman who was shot in the shoulder, police said. The four victims were transported to UChicago Medicine, where they were listed in good condition, police said.
By 5 p.m., traffic all around the intersection at East 43rd and South Cottage Grove Avenue had stopped. Both the Dr. Martin Luther King Community Service Center and Judge Slater Apartments, a 403-unit senior building, bordered the scene. As police worked inside the crime scene tape, people stood in groups and wheeled back and forth inside the senior building’s fenced-in yard.
Nelson, wearing a shirt that read “Bronzeville: The Musical,” said he and his neighbors had been complaining to local leaders about shootings and other hazards between Langley and Cottage Grove Avenues for years.
“Just in October, three of our units had bullets come in from another incident,” he said.
The last neighbor had just finished getting her windows replaced this past weekend, he said.
In an email to the Tribune, Linsey Maughan, spokesperson for the Department of Family and Support Services, which runs the Dr. Martin Luther King Community Service Center, stated DFSS leadership were “saddened” to learn of the shooting. Maughan confirmed that none of the victims were King Center staff. Counseling services will be available at the King Center Tuesday for anyone seeking support, Maughan said, adding that the center will also operate as a cooling center Tuesday as scheduled.
“This incident remains under investigation by the Chicago Police Department and a lot of details about what occurred today remain unclear,” Maughan said. “As we continue to learn more and work through this together, we are thankful to know all King Center staff are safe. DFSS and King Center staff remain committed (to) supporting the Bronzeville community and will continue to provide resources via the King Center during this difficult time.”
No one was in custody, and no other offender information was immediately available as of Monday afternoon, as Wentworth area detectives investigated, police said.
The shooting comes after thirteen people were shot, two fatally, on the West Side in what appeared to be separate incidents early Sunday morning. The fatalities included an 18-year-old, identified by the Cook County medical examiner’s office as Kaleb Williams, and a 22-year-old woman whose identity had not been released Monday.
