A car drove slowly past a Chatham homicide scene early Wednesday and came to a halt near the corner of 78th and Calumet.
The man in the back seat called out his window: “What happened?”
“There was a shooting,” a nearby detective told him.
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“Is everyone OK?”
The detective paused. “Not this time,” he said.
A 43-year-old man was driving in the 7700 block of South Calumet Avenue about 10:35 p.m. Tuesday when someone opened fire from the sidewalk. He was shot multiple times in the back, then drove down the block and crashed into a row of parked cars.
He was taken to Stroger Hospital and pronounced dead. He was identified as Tyrone White, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office.
Seventeen-year-old Tiara and her mother Taray, who live on the block, stood on the edge of the crime scene, watching as police inspected the Cadillac that had smashed into their neighbors’ cars.
Tiara heard the gunshots and thought they were firecrackers — maybe an M-80 that someone had set off in a garbage can. She heard squealing tires and thought maybe it was a movie her twin sister was watching.
Then her sister came running.
“She came and said, ‘Somebody got shot, come quick, come quick,’ ” Tiara said. “I saw the ambulance right here. They took him out and he was bleeding real bad.”
The block generally is quiet, said Taray, 54, who has lived nearby for most of her life.
“I’ve seen shootings, but not this close to home,” she said.
She gestured to her daughter.
“I keep telling them, now you know why I always want to know where you are,” she said.
The man killed on Calumet was one of at least seven people shot since Tuesday morning.
Early Wednesday on the South Side, a 24-year-old man was shot dead in the Gresham neighborhood. Just before 2:35 a.m., officers found him on the sidewalk in the 8000 block of South Marshfield Avenue. He had been shot in the head and was pronounced dead at the scene. Information about the circumstances of the shooting was not available.
About 7:30 a.m. Tuesday on the Far South Side, police in the 9200 block of South Bishop Street found Said E. Hayik, 25, unresponsive in a gangway with a gunshot wound to the back of his head, according to authorities.
Hayik lived in the 5200 block of West 23rd Street in Cicero, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office. He was pronounced dead at the scene at 7:59 a.m.
Other shootings:
About 1:35 a.m. Wednesday, a 25-year-old man was shot in the leg in the Morgan Park neighborhood. He was getting out of a vehicle in the 11400 block of South Ada Street when someone fired shots. He went to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn with two gunshot wounds to the leg and was listed in good condition.
About 10:30 p.m. Tuesday, a 56-year-old man was shot in both legs in East Garfield Park. He went to Stroger Hospital after being wounded in the 3900 block of West Wilcox Street, police said. His condition was stabilized.
Just after 8:50 p.m., a 25-year-old man was shot in the Fifth City neighborhood on the West Side. He got himself to Stroger Hospital with a gunshot wound to the right leg and told investigators he was shot in the 3300 block of West Congress Parkway. Someone walked up to the man and announced a robbery, according to police. When the man tried to grab the would-be robber’s gun, it went off, and he was shot in the leg. His condition was stabilized.
About 2 p.m., a 23-year-old man was shot in the hip in the Austin neighborhood on the West Side. He was standing in the 5200 block of West Ferdinand Street when he heard shots and felt pain, said Officer Thomas Sweeney, a Chicago police spokesman. He was taken to West Suburban Medical Center before being transferred to Stroger Hospital in serious condition.
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