People are over-reacting, it's just transitory crime

Drive-by gunman opens fire on a packed Gold Coast bar, but no injuries are reported

December 19, 2021 CWBChicago

It’s a recipe for disaster, and it could have produced much different results.

Chicago police say a drive-by gunman opened fire on a packed Division Street nightclub in the Gold Coast early Sunday, breaking a front window and damaging a TV inside the bar. But, miraculously, no injuries were reported.

It happened just west of the intersection of State

and Division streets around 3:04 a.m., police said.

Surveillance video showed someone shooting at the bar from inside a gray Mercedes SUV that rolled down the block. Officers at the scene said several bullet holes were visible in the bar’s front window.

A television inside the bar was struck by a round, too, according to a CPD statement.

The Mercedes was hijacked earlier in the evening, according to initial information from the scene.

If it is a hijacked car, it will be the second time this weekend that shots have been fired from carjacked vehicles downtown.

On Friday evening, a man and woman were shot on the 400 block of North Wabash by a gunman who stepped out of a newly-hijacked Audi, according to a CPD report and a police media statement.

The male victim suffered multiple gunshot wounds to his left torso and was listed in serious condition at Northwestern Memorial Hospital. The woman, who sustained a gunshot wound to her thigh, was in good condition at the same hospital.

No arrests have been made in Friday’s shooting. The victims are the 64th and 65th persons shot on the Near North Side this year. There were 42 shooting victims in the area through all of last year and 33 in 2019.