Woman shot while walking with her son near Near North Side movie theater
A mother and son visiting Chicago were caught in the crossfire in Streeterville Sunday night.
The head of the city's public safety committee said the shooting is tied to large teen gatherings that have been plaguing the downtown neighborhood for months.
Fire crews treated the 46-year-old woman, who was then taken to Northwestern Hospital in good condition and later released. She was walking with her young son at the time when she was shot.
The call came in just after 8 p.m. Sunday when the woman was shot in the arm walking down the sidewalk with her son.
"We have to take this seriously and treat it as the potential life-ending incident that it really is," said Alderman Brian Hopkins.
Ald. Hopkins leads the city's public safety committee and said the shooting tied to an incident involving a large group of teens that were kicked out of the AMC River East movie theater.
"Security kicked them out, which was the appropriate thing to do, but once they were out on the street, a fight ensued with pushing, shoving, and punches thrown. Someone took a gun out of his backpack and fired shots. Unfortunately, an innocent tourist who just happened to be walking across the street was struck by the gunfire," Hopkins said.
He said the theater has worked with the city and police to instate a policy requiring minors to be accompanied by adults.
"We have a summer plan that we are working on right now," Hopkins said. "It involves police, and it involves making arrests. Hopefully, it will involve arresting the parents who allow their 13-year-olds to take a gun and go downtown."
There's a history here.
Chicago police would not tell me how many times they've been called out here in the past few months for similar incidents, but just this month, there was at least one other response to the theater.
A large neighborhood meeting occurred last year in June with Streeterville residents who were fed up with rowdy teen gatherings in the area.
The neighborhood organization said they're already contacting police about cracking down on the area as the weather warms up, given its history.
"There is no neighborhood where this is acceptable," Hopkins said. "When it happens downtown in a tourist area where there's hotels and conventions, it has international repercussions because people choose not to come to Chicago. So, we lose tax money, and the tax money is what we need to spend on the social programs that can potentially address the root causes."
Chicago police are still reviewing surveillance video from the shooting that is still under investigation.
