Eric Billops was standing at a bus stop Wednesday afternoon as Hyde Park Academy was letting out for the day when witnesses told police another person in a school uniform came up to him, took a gun out of a book bag and started to fire.
Billops, 16, was shot multiple times and was pronounced dead soon afterward, according to a police report obtained by the Tribune. A 16-year-old girl was shot in the calf, per the report.
Grand Crossing (3rd) District police and Wentworth Area detectives later learned that Billops and the possible suspect, another Hyde Park Academy student, had been planning to fight after school, the report stated. That student had been let out of school early and returned to the area around dismissal, according to the report.
The suspected shooter walked up to Billops at the bus stop, took a gun out of his backpack and started firing before he fled to the south, witnesses said.
According to the police report, the school’s dean said multiple other students told him the identity of the shooter, whom witnesses saw run southbound away from the scene.
The shooting sent Hyde Park Academy into a soft lockdown. In a letter to families, principal Rosette Edinburg wrote that crisis and care teams would be available to help support students and staff in the wake of the shooting.
“We are extremely saddened by this incident,” Edinburg continued in her letter, “and will do everything we can to help our school community heal.”
Earlier this month, another Hyde Park Academy student Lania Smith, 18, was killed after being struck by a hit-and-run driver in Dolton. She was a part of the high school’s pom squad and was planning to enroll in nursing school after graduation, her aunt said.
Police recovered about a dozen handgun shell casings at the scene of the Wednesday shooting, as well as two book bags. No one was in custody as of Wednesday night.
Billops’ mother did not immediately return requests for comment.
