Chicagoland

What is going on with you people down there? It's a flippin war zone. Very disheartening.





By Mitch Smith, Peter Nickeas and Juan Perez Jr.
Tribune reporters
2:28 p.m. CDT, July 19, 2014

Shamiya Adams was sitting on a bedroom floor in her best friend's home, making s'mores after an evening of practicing a dance routine, when the bullet entered the West Side home.

The bullet crashed through the wall of the Garfield Park bedroom where the 11-year-old sat and hit her in the head. She collapsed and was rushed to Mount Sinai Hospital, where family kept an overnight vigil until the girl was pronounced dead at 7:33 a.m. today.

"They came out and told us she wasn't going to make it," Shamiya's grandmother said. "Oh, my God."

As the night wore on, about 40 people joined hands outside the hospital, forming a circle and praying.

"Just be with us, God. We need you now," one woman pleaded as a black SUV filled with police rolled past. "We need you now like never before."

Thirteen hours later, as police searched for the gunman, marshmallows and Hershey bars were still spread out on the bed, remnants of a summer sleepover turned tragic.

Some of the girl's remains were still on the floor of the bedroom, just beneath a stuffed Tweety Bird doll hanging from the bedroom wall.

"Everybody was in the room," said Aaron Hill, who lives at the house but said he wasn't there at the time of the shooting. "They were just doing their girlie things. They heard shots and a bullet came through the window."

Hill said Shamiya was best friends with one of his younger daughters. She had a "big smile," he said while choking back tears on his porch in East Garfield Park, just a couple blocks from the Eisenhower Expressway.

At the hospital, community activist Andrew Holmes urged the public to call authorities with information about the shooting. "We don't want these perpetrators on the street to rest nowhere tonight."

Earlier, a 12-year-old girl was wounded, one of more than 20 people wounded over 12 hours Friday and early Saturday in Chicago.

The girl, along with a 33-year-old woman and a 44-year-old man, were attacked in the 700 block of North Ridgeway Avenue about 3:30 p.m., police said. The girl suffered a graze wound to the foot, and the woman suffered a non-life-threatening gunshot wound above her right eye.

Their conditions were stabilized at John H. Stroger Jr. Hospital, said Chicago Police Department News Affairs Offier Veejay Zala. The man suffered a graze wound to the right calf and declined medical treatment, Zala said.

The victims told police they were approached by someone they didn't know, who fired shots at them.

In other shootings:

• A 30-year-old man was killed in the Austin neighborhood about 3 a.m. He was found in the front seat of a car, shot in the neck, back and shoulder in an alley next to Laramie Avenue just north of Madison Street. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

• Someone shot a 35-year-old man in the Englewood neighborhood about 3 a.m. He was wounded in the leg and taken to John H. Stroger Jr. Hospital of Cook County, police said. Police said the man was on a sidewalk when someone opened fire from inside a passing dark vehicle.

• A 15-year-old boy was shot in the West Englewood neighborhood about 12:50 a.m. He was sitting in a parked car, in the 7000 block of South Winchester Avenue, when someone in a passing white van opened fire, police said. The boy was taken to Holy Cross Hospital with an arm wound.

• A 19-year-old man was in serious condition after someone shot him in a Lawndale neighborhood alley about 12:20 a.m. He was shot in an alley east of the 1200 block of South Christiana Avenue and ran around the corner onto 13th Street, where police found him bleeding from a wound to his back. He was taken in serious condition to Mount Sinai Hospital, police said.

• Two men, 24 and 33, were shot about 12:10 a.m. in the 500 block of East 71st Street in the Grand Crossing neighborhood. The younger man was shot in the abdomen and taken to John H. Stroger Jr. Hospital of Cook County while the older was taken to University of Chicago Hospital with a foot wound. The two told the police they "heard shots and felt pain."

• Four men were shot in the 1300 block of North Mason Avenue in the North Austin neighborhood about 11:30 p.m. All four took themselves to hospitals.

A 24-year-old man was shot in the arm and went to West Suburban Medical Center.

A 33-year-old man with foot and knee wounds, and a 31-year-old man with an arm wound, also went to West Suburban Medical Center.

The fourth man, 30, walked into Oak Park Hospital with a foot wound. The 33-year-old was later transferred to John H. Stroger Jr. Hospital of Cook County.

• Three people were wounded on the 4000 block of West Maypole Avenue in the West Garfield Park neighborhood about 11:30 p.m. One walked into Mount Sinai Hospital, one was dropped off at a fire station on Maypole, and the third was taken to the hospital, police said.

A 15-year-old boy was shot in the leg and a 32-year-old suffered a graze wound, police said. The two were taken to Mount Sinai Hospital, along with a 22-year-old man who was went to Mount Sinai Hospital on his own.

• About 11:20 p.m. someone shot a 25-year-old man in the ankle near Haddon Street and Long Avenue on the West Side. He was taken to Mount Sinai Hospital. Police said he had been sitting on a porch when two men approached and at least one started shooting.

• A 38-year-old man suffered a gunshot wound to the eye in the 7600 block of South Drexel Boulevard about 11:05 p.m., police said, citing preliminary information. He was listed in stable condition at Advocate Christ Medical Center.

• A 15-year-old boy was shot in the 11800 block of South Yale Avenue about 10:30 p.m. He suffered wounds to the arm and foot and his condition was stabilized at Roseland Community Hospital. He was outside when someone walked up and shot him, police said.

• A 26-year-old man was shot near Armitage and Lamon avenues about 10:50 p.m. The man suffered gunshot wounds to the shoulder, abdomen and leg. He was taken to Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center in serious condition.

He was standing on the block when someone drove up in a light-colored car. The 26-year-old and the man in the car exchanged words. The man in the car got out and started shooting, police said. The man who shot the 26-year-old fled the scene.

• About 5:50 p.m., a 33-year-old man was wounded in both legs in the 3800 block of West Wabansia Avenue, Zala said. The man walked into the St. Elizabeth campus of Sts. Mary and Elizabeth Medical Center, although he was possibly transferred to Stroger.