Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Three Shootings In A Week And A Half

Seems the gangs aren't taking any time off from the violence for the holidays. In addition to the Christmas Day shooting and yesterday's Sunnyside Mall shooting, there was another shooting on December 19th that slipped under the radar:

According to wbbm780.com, "TWO MEN WERE SHOT following a gang-related shooting Friday night in the North Side’s Uptown neighborhood. The shooting was reported at 900 W. Windsor Ave., according to Town Hall District police. Two known local gang members were shot by members of another gang, police said. The men were walking down the street when they heard gunshots and felt pain, police News Affairs Officer John Henry said.

Both men were taken to Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center with gunshot wounds to their biceps. One man was treated and released and the other man remains hospitalized. No one is in custody for the shooting. Belmont Area detectives are investigating."

33 comments:

  1. These shootings seem to be concentrated in a rather specific portion of the neighborhood lately. Are the authorities connecting the dots and increasing patrols around this spot. Again, where are you oh great and powerful vigilante?

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  2. The shootings are all located in the travel routes of known gang members.

    900 w windsor
    4500 n magnolia
    4500 n broadway

    Eyes up whenever you are approaching or leaving these zones. You are walking through a targeted gang territory. Rival gangs know where to find their enemies.

    I'd advise you to change your course of travel if you see more than 2 people walking together in a group that are in the age of gang activity. That's 15-35 years of age and males.

    Gang members live around these zones. Other gang members commute to these zones to support their locals.

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  3. think it's because the schools are on break?! i didn't think thugs went to school...

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  4. The Soul of M.H.,

    How do you know/find out the travel routes of known gang members? I'm not being sarcastic...I really want to know.

    I try to avoid Hazel/Windsor and Sheridan/Windsor which are sketchy even during the day.

    Thanks!

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  5. Be assured that Shiller is delighted by such news. She was probably disappointed with a murder/shooting free Autumn. She certainly would not want law-abiding, tax-paying citizens to think that Uptown is a safe area to move to.

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  6. How do you know/find out the travel routes of known gang members? I'm not being sarcastic...I really want to know.

    Talk to the kids. The really young kids. Really. They know the checkpoints the gangs have established to track their future recruits. The gangs primary agenda is to get capital and get recruits. They go hand in hand with knowing your terrain and knowing who and what travels through that terrain.

    I'm just some white guy. I'm not a recruitment target. I'm a capital target. Jump me and get what you can. That's the gang's view of me.

    The kids is a different story. They're potential recruits. They face daily pressure from the gangs to support them. They face daily propaganda that their neighbors are racist, classist, gentrifying imperial overlords. The gang is their only protectorate.

    This world the gang creates around these kids might as well be a toxic waste dump. Their life expectancies are about the same as living in a toxic waste dump.

    This is the primary reason why Shiller has to go. She might as well just get the tatoos. She's already practically pledged devotion to the Black P Stone Rangers. They're the experts at drawing tax payer money to foster the development of their gang. They've been doing it since the 60s.

    Shiller's silence on crime is the Rosetta Stone in Uptown. She has the right to remain silent. We don't.

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  7. The truly sad thing is that the kids are getting this propaganda directly from the alderman's office.

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  8. I feel like we should start a neighborhood push to call 311/911 more often. Like everyone pledge to call 911 3x/week. Every time you see someone walking down the street with an alcoholic beverage open; every time you see someone "whistling" at cars/walkers passing by; every time you see a group playing dice in the middle of the street; every time you see someone pissing on a car, tree, dumpster, alleyway.

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  9. You should already be taking these actions. Have you not done this in the past? I'm not trying to be sarcastic but have you not been calling 911 when you see criminal activity?

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  10. Here's another great resource (previously posted by UU) for knowing where gangs hang out. It's interactive - scroll to your block, zoom in and click on the shaded boxes to see what gangs call each area home:

    http://chicagogangs.org/index.php?pr=GANG_MAP_NORTH

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  11. slats - let's not be rash with our friendly neighbors. i have been, but i highly doubt that all of the readers of this blog have been... it's unrealistic of you to assume so. people are hesitant to call 911.

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  12. I don't mean to come across as rash. I'm just confused as to why folks are hesitant to call 911. I don't get it. I call all the time and also use all the tools available thru 311.

    It's so easy to pick up phone and dial 911. ???

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  13. Nothing wrong with repetition.

    311 for most everything: lights out, trash anywhere, street improvements, graffiti, etc.

    911 for all criminal and emergency items: loitering, dice, gambling, curfew violations, suspicious activity.

    Never make things up. Lies never help the cause.

    Think about Uptown. I make one call to 311 everyday. I make about two calls to 911 every week.

    Make the incidence reporting balloon in Uptown as big as the housing bubble.

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  14. What's up with these gang members mostly getting shot in the leg, ass or arm. Non fatal areas. Are they just trying to send a message to rival gangs by wounding them instead of killing them? I guess attempted murder is less of a crime than murder. Or are they just bad shots?

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  15. I looked at the map. Does anyone know if the Imperial Insane Vice Lords are still active on the stretch of Beacon between Leland and Wilson? I've lived in the area for 2 years and it's great... I haven't seen/heard anything.

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  16. Or are they just bad shots?

    Well if innocent bystanders killed is any indication, I'd vote for bad shots. Maybe the reason there was no one else hurt in these shootings is that no one else was around.

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  17. I attended the beat 2311 CAPS meeting in the sunnyside mall this summer and was actually impressed with the strategy of the gang members there. I heard time and time again them pitching the racial shame tone of how they are constantly getting hassaled by P.D. and people calling 911 on them just for hanging out, iand just because they're poor doesn't make them bangers. YEAH hanging-in a known gang/narcotics area to boot(we're I've witnessed many narc exchanges myself). Afterward even I doubted myself "hmmm, maybe I've judged too harsh in the past...". The ironic eye opener was that one of the young guys I was talked too that was singing this toon was front and center on the AREA 3 police "MUG" sheet that was pasted out by the Dept. that night for known offenders to watch out for. Previously arrested for "strong armed robbery". One other, whom is extremely polite and hard not to like I've seen slinging dope once or twice since.

    My mind really changed when I almost walked right in the middle of a potential shooting involving the "youth" in the mall and a man I've never seen before brandishing a gun.

    The point of my rambling hear is: Don't hesitate to call 911 @ the very least P.D. can respond and are paid professionals let them figure out if something suspicious is really going on. You wouldn't hesitate to call for the FIRE DEPT. if you thought a building was on fire.

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  18. I went to a CAPS meeting a long while back, where a female officer chuckled when someone complained about the gangs and violence.

    "This is nothing. I live on the south side, where we have shootings every day."

    I never saw this cop at any subsequent meetings.

    Also, anyone who plays the race card is a douche bag, and should immediately be red-flagged as someone whose veracity should be questioned.

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  19. "Where is Helen Shiller?"

    She's probably pondering over a giant map of Uptown, looking for empty spaces to fill with questionable, self-serving social services, ill-conceived developments, with a nice set of ear plugs to block out the cries, common sense and outrage of her ward.

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  20. Helen Shiller is toasting this latest rash of shootings. She LOVES it. What could be better for her than law-abiding citizens and families being afraid of buying or renting in her ward - all of whom would be sure to cast a vote for anybody but her in 2011. For every good person that moves elsewhere, that is one less blistered junkie or bleeding heart goofball she needs to keep upright on election day. I personally beleive that she is truly that bad of a sociopath/narcissist/scumbag/villan/crook/gangster/etc. that she is pleased with every shooting and every related news story. She really sickens me.

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  21. I don't think she's pleased with the violence. That's a bit of a stretch.
    But she surely is a huge source of frustration in Uptown.

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  22. Helen is only concerned about getting re-elected. That's the first job of any politician and will be Barack's on 1/21/09...:) If Wilson Yard is sitting empty or partially done in 2011, she will have to bus even more homeless in to vote for her. A completed Wilson Yard with Target in place means lots for her reelection efforts despite the gang presence. If you see something suspicious, just call the police. The more 911 tickets our neighborhood has, the more the CPD has #s to quantify what is going on. I agree with Helen on many things, but building Wilson Yard as planned with TIFs is idiotic. It's 2009, not 1989...

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  23. I agree that Shiller is probably secretly happy about shootings like this - and crime, plight, and filth in Uptown in general. Why wouldn't she be? She only cares about herself and is quite adept and taking care of herself at the expense of the community (i.e. Wilson Yard). Clearly, doing nothing but oppressing and neglecting her ward and supposed constituents has been very good for her career - she continues to get reelected with relative ease. She does not do anything in response to this crime because she simply does not have to.

    Do you think she cares about what you think or feel, or about any post on this blog, or any of these scumbags destroying our neighborhood?

    Like many of our elected officials in IL/Chicago, she is a personality disordered jerk who could care less about spitting right in the faces of those they are supposed to be serving and helping. She views you, me, and everyone who opposes her as yuppie scum.

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  24. HOW ALDERMAN SMITH HANDLED CRIME IN HER WARD...

    Last summer residents in the 48th ward who live on Magnolia north of Lawrence had several incidents with people being robbed while parking their cars in the evening.

    An employee from Ald. Smith's office proctively contacted the block club president, met with him to walk the street and recommended they trim the trees and install the brighter, pedestrian-friendly streets lights.

    Within 2 weeks the work was done. Brighter, safer streets for the residents and no further incidents.

    What a difference an alderman makes.

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  25. Helen sees herself as the savior of the poor. The problem is that this also represents the views of the Tribune, Reader and most residents living south of Irving Park. She is no longer able to cast herself as the independent and that will be her downfall. She's now totally absorbed into the Chicago way of doing things.

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  26. Logically (not necessarily realistically) speaking, how does being savior of the poor have anything to do with inactivity towards violence?!

    Please note that the alderman's office has shortened hours this week. Must be nice.

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  27. Helen believes CAPS and anything to lessen violence is an all out frontal attack on poor people. It's the rich white condo owner's assault to get rid them from the neighborhood. Helen forgets that poor people don't like crime & violence either, but that's just the price to pay to keep rents down. You'll notice that when people complain about crime, she will chime in that this isn't Lincoln Park or as her chief of staff likes to say, "The only place without crime is heaven."

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  28. "I try to avoid Hazel/Windsor and Sheridan/Windsor which are sketchy even during the day."

    I LIVE on Windsor and Hazel. I live here with my family, my 19 month old son. My street is not sketchy, not during the day, and not at night. I have never been afraid of my neighborhood or neighbors. The shooting that happened on my corner did scare the hell out of me, I was putting my baby to bed when it happened, his window overlooks that corner, and the shots were so loud. The kids who got shot do not live on my street, nor do the shooters. But it did happen at a time where people are normally out, walking their dogs, coming home from work or the jewell; anyone could have gotten shot in the crossfire. I have never heard a shooting on my street before, I wouldn't call it "targeted gang territory". I walk through my neighborhood everyday, and so do a large number of kids who live here and walk home from school. There is no need to change your direction because 3 kids are walking down the street together. I have lived on this corner for over 5 years, with a very short break at UIUC; just because there are kids who live in the area, and happen to be black, does not make them gang members. The shooting on my corner was scary and awful, but we still have to be reasonable human beings.

    On a side note...I can't believe our Alderman's complete disregard for safety of the residents of her ward; I can't believe she just totally ignores this. She is truly the most irresponsible and worthless local politician.

    "I feel like we should start a neighborhood push to call 311/911 more often. Like everyone pledge to call 911 3x/week. Every time you see someone walking down the street with an alcoholic beverage open; every time you see someone "whistling" at cars/walkers passing by; every time you see a group playing dice in the middle of the street; every time you see someone pissing on a car, tree, dumpster, alleyway."

    Really???? Some people have no business living in a city at all. Why is it a problem when homeless people do these things, but it is totally acceptable for white frat boys? Pissing in the alley is hardly criminal activity. Call 911 when it is a real life threatening emergency only, let's not waste time and resources on this kind of bullshit. Call 311 to report tagging, or trash..the trash actually needs to be picked up around here every once in a while.

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  29. Pissing in the alley actually is a criminal offense, regardless of whether it's a Wrigleyville frat boy or an Uptown resident. This is a 911 offense, Stef.

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  30. Well Meghan, you can call 911 when you see a homeless person pissing in the alley, if you feel that is really necessary. 911 is for real emergencies, not to report humans doing what humans biologically need to do and have no where else to go. I can hardly see how peeing in an alley is criminal activity. Who is the victim, where is the crime? It is dehumanizing they way we treat homeless people...but you carry on wasting the city's resources.

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  31. At least for me, the ones I see pissing aren't usually homeless. They're drunks that have homes. I've never peed in public, but some of my friends have and have been cited for it. It's legitimate. If you think it's a waste of city resources, you should ask the city to consider removing it as a crime from the city's municipal code.

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