6 dead, 30 hurt in shooting at Chicago-area July 4 parade | AP News
Category: News & Politics
Via: perrie-halpern • 3 years ago • 119 commentsBy: MICHAEL TARM, KATHLEEN FOODY and ROGER SCHNEIDER
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
HIGHLAND PARK, Ill. (AP) — A gunman on a rooftop opened fire on an Independence Day parade in suburban Chicago on Monday, killing at least six people, wounding at least 30 and sending hundreds of marchers, parents with strollers and children on bicycles fleeing in terror, police said.
Authorities said a man named as a person of interest in the shooting was taken into police custody Monday evening after an hourslong manhunt in and around Highland Park, an affluent community of about 30,000 on Chicago's north shore.
The July 4 shooting was just the latest to shatter the rituals of American life. Schools, churches, grocery stores and now community parades have all become killing grounds in recent months. This time, the bloodshed came as the nation tried to find cause to celebrate its founding and the bonds that still hold it together.
"It definitely hits a lot harder when it's not only your hometown but it's also right in front of you," resident Ron Tuazon said as he and a friend returned to the parade route Monday evening to retrieve chairs, blankets and a child's bike that he and his family abandoned when the shooting began.
"It's commonplace now," Tuazon said of what he called yet another American atrocity. "We don't blink anymore. Until laws change, it's going to be more of the same."
The shooting occurred at a spot on the parade route where many residents had staked out prime viewing points early in the day for the annual celebration. Dozens of fired bullets sent hundreds of parade-goers — some visibly bloodied — fleeing. They left a trail of abandoned items that showed everyday life suddenly, violently disrupted: A half-eaten bag of potato chips; a box of chocolate cookies spilled onto the grass; a child's Chicago Cubs cap.
"There's no safe place," said Highland Park resident Barbara Harte, 73, who had stayed away from the parade fearing a mass shooting, but later ventured from her home.
Highland Park Police Chief Lou Jogmen said a police officer pulled over Robert E. Crimo III about five miles north of the shooting scene, several hours after police released the man's photo and an image of his silver Honda Fit, and warned the public that he was likely armed and dangerous. Authorities initially said he was 22, but an FBI bulletin and Crimo's social media said he was 21.
Police declined to immediately identify Crimo as a suspect but said identifying him as a person of interest, sharing his name and other information publicly was a serious step.
Lake County Major Crime Task Force spokesman Christopher Covelli said at a news conference "several of the deceased victims" died at the scene and one was taken to a hospital and died there. Police have not released details about the victims or wounded.
Lake County Coroner Jennifer Banek said the five people killed at the parade were adults, but didn't have information on the sixth victim who was taken to a hospital and died there. One of those killed was a Mexican national, Roberto Velasco, Mexico's director for North American affairs, said on Twitter Monday. He said two other Mexicans were wounded.
NorthShore University Health Center received 26 patients after the attack. All but one had gunshot wounds, said Dr. Brigham Temple, medical director of emergency preparedness. Their ages ranged from 8 to 85, and Temple estimated that four or five patients were children.
Temple said 19 of them were treated and discharged. Others were transferred to other hospitals, while two patients, in stable condition, remained at the Highland Park hospital.
"It is devastating that a celebration of America was ripped apart by our uniquely American plague," Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker said at a news conference.
"I'm furious because it does not have to be this way... while we celebrate the Fourth of July just once a year, mass shootings have become a weekly — yes, weekly — American tradition."
The shooter opened fire around 10:15 a.m., when the parade was about three-quarters through, authorities said.
Highland Park Police Commander Chris O'Neill, the incident commander on scene, said the gunman apparently used a "high-powered rifle" to fire from a spot atop a commercial building where he was "very difficult to see." He said the rifle was recovered at the scene. Police also found a ladder attached to the building.
"Very random, very intentional and a very sad day," Covelli said.
President Joe Biden on Monday said he and first lady Jill Biden were "shocked by the senseless gun violence that has yet again brought grief to an American community on this Independence Day."
Biden signed the widest-ranging gun violence bill passed by Congress in decades, a compromise that showed at once both progress on a long-intractable issue and the deep-seated partisan divide that persists.
As a word of an arrest spread, residents who had hunkered in homes began venturing outside, some walking toward where the shooting occurred. Several people stood and stared at the scene, with abandoned picnic blankets, hundreds of lawn chairs and backpacks still where they were when the shooting began.
Police believe there was only one shooter but warned that he should still be considered armed and dangerous. Several nearby cities canceled events including parades and fireworks, some of them noting that the Highland Park shooter was still at large. The Chicago White Sox also announced on Twitter that a planned post-game fireworks show is canceled due to the shooting.
More than 100 law enforcement officers were called to the parade scene or dispatched to find the suspected shooter.
More than a dozen police officers on Monday surrounded a home listed as an address for Crimo in Highland Park. Some officers held rifles as they fixed their eyes on the home. Police blockaded roads leading to the home in a tree-lined neighborhood near a golf course, allowing only select law enforcement cars through a tight outer perimeter.
Crimo, who goes by the name Bobby, was an aspiring rapper with the stage name Awake the Rapper, posting on social media dozens videos and songs, some ominous and violent.
In one animated video since taken down by YouTube, Crimo raps about armies "walking in darkness" as a drawing appears of a man pointing a rifle, a body on the ground and another figure with hands up in the distance. A later frame shows a close-up of a chest with blood pouring out and another of police cars arriving as the shooter holds his hands up.
In another video, in which Crimo appears in a classroom wearing a black bicycle helmet, he says he is "like a sleepwalker… I know what I have to do," then adds, "Everything has led up to this. Nothing can stop me, even myself."
Crimo's father, Bob, a longtime deli owner, ran unsuccessfully for mayor of Highland Park in 2019, calling himself "a person for the people."
Highland Park is a close-knit community of about 30,000 people located on the shores of Lake Michigan just north of Chicago, with mansions and sprawling lakeside estates that have long drawn the rich and sometimes famous, including NBA legend Michael Jordan, who lived in the city for years when he played for the Chicago Bulls. John Hughes filmed parts of several movies in the city, including "Ferris Bueller's Day Off," "Sixteen Candles" and "Weird Science."
Ominous signs of a joyous event suddenly turned to horror filled both sides of Central Avenue where the shooting occurred. Dozens of baby strollers — some bearing American flags, abandoned children's bikes and a helmet bedecked with images of Cinderella were left behind. Blankets, lawn chairs, coffees and water bottles were knocked over as people fled.
Gina Troiani and her son were lined up with his daycare class ready to walk onto the parade route when she heard a loud sound that she believed was fireworks — until she heard people yell about a shooter. In a video that Troiani shot on her phone, some of the kids are visibly startled at the loud noise, and they scramble to the side of the road as a siren wails nearby.
"We just start running in the opposite direction," she told The Associated Press.
Her 5-year-old son was riding his bike decorated with red and blue curled ribbons. He and other children in the group held small American flags. The city said on its website that the festivities were to include a children's bike and pet parade.
Troiani said she pushed her son's bike, running through the neighborhood to get back to their car.
"It was just sort of chaos," she said. "There were people that got separated from their families, looking for them. Others just dropped their wagons, grabbed their kids and started running."
Debbie Glickman, a Highland Park resident, said she was on a parade float with coworkers and the group was preparing to turn onto the main route when she saw people running from the area.
"People started saying: 'There's a shooter, there's a shooter, there's a shooter,'" Glickman told the AP. "So we just ran. We just ran. It's like mass chaos down there."
She didn't hear any noises or see anyone who appeared to be injured.
"I'm so freaked out," she said. "It's just so sad."
___
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Where is the Good Guy with the Gun on a Rooftop, when you need one....
Has anyone else noticed, these are less and less alarming to they and others, because we are just becoming so damn accustomed to mass shooting norms, that we are becoming more callous to these horrors, and this, is not good. This is not the country we had envisioned it would be, nor should it be, but the rhetoric and division, cuts deep with an incision, and as we lacerate with much hate, we observe another observation, observing but yet, another laceration gouged out of this Nation on a National Holiday, that not all were given to have off and celebrate, unless, here to celebrate the more hate, that is quite obviously, our own brought about fate,
that really MUST CHANGE.
I was thinking the same thing - there were good guys with guns in the crowd ready to step in and prevent this but they werent looking up to a four story rooftop at the time. It's always something, isnt it?
I understand that the shooter's gun was legally obtained.
This is notable in a state with some of the most toughest gun laws in the country.
You work much faster than the investigating authorities.
Looks like another liberal loony tune.
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2022/07/05/highland-park-shooter-was-known-to-law-enforcement-n2609739?utm_campaign=rightrailsticky1
“I understand that the shooter's gun was legally obtained.”
And what does that say about the ease of legally obtaining such weaponry?
I actually read the entire article you link to. There isnt a word in there about him being a liberal .
Why the lying Greg?
As per your MO, your link does NOT support your statement.
Look up a comment concerning "Where's Waldo" and Antifa joining Trump rallies.
It isn't coincidence he is dress exactly like Waldo in two of the pictures.
Um, no.. Numerous pictures of him at trump rallies... he's in the red pants.
And again in his waldo outfit.
Fox and Fox Business channels tried the same thing Monday and yesterday. Then gave up and tried to divert and say well, Chicago had 57 shootings over the weekend, when they got their heads out their natural habitat (their asses) and accepted Highland Park is 25 miles north of Chicago.
Lol.
"The pictures of him being at the Trump rally — I remember asking him about it because he was not a Trump supporter at all, and it threw me off,” Nodfather said. “I was like, ‘What the fuck are you doing there?’ And he was like, ‘Look at my shirt.’ He was wearing a Where’s Waldo shirt. So, he just wanted to fuck with people. He just wanted to be funny.”
The "he was Trump supporter" narrative will live on forever, no matter the reality. Like Officer Sicknick being murdered at the Jan 6th riot. Reality doesn't matter.
Online friends? I am sure they knew as much about each other as you and I do...
online friends
It seems like that's where he lived his life.
am sure they knew as much about each other as you and I do..
If I was accused of being a die hard Biden supporter, would that make sense to you?
It also said that they never saw anything that would be suspicious? Uh, he had a video where he was pretending to shoot up a school....
Being a die hard trump supporter makes no sense to me.
So his on-line friend gave us one explanation of why he wear a Waldo shirt to the rally, do you have an alternative explanation?
I would trust what an online friend knows about what I do in real life as much as I would trust trump to be a decent human being.
Is that what folks here call deflection?
Can a deflection be deflected.
Sad. So very sad.
... another trolling comment.
Most of the mass shooters have held leftist and liberal views....check It out.
That is a widely debunked conspiracy theory.
Most mass shooters are gang bangers.
The left doesn't count them; as are most are the wrong racial demographic.
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A country filled with "gunslingers" wanting to shoot up the town because they don't like the people who live in the town.
If only these right wing nostalgia loving people would actually go back and watch all the western movies from the '50's and '60's, they would see so many plot lines about how the "Gunslingers", "Gun toters" were asked to leave their guns outside the tavern, outside the church, or asked by the sheriff to leave their rifle hitched to their horse outside the establishment.
“…were asked to leave their guns outside the tavern…”
… where ordinary people would respect the property of others and not steal. Today it gets stolen and fenced in time for tonight’s hit.
This is a meme that pro-gun forces are posting today...
Well, that and a bunch of insurrectionists took on a government.
To assert, not subvert, representative government!
No, I usually have a pretty strong stomach. I would feel like heaving though if I had a hard morning PT run after a party night and at the end of the run we went past the mess hall - the smell of all that grease could get to me.
A seventh victim has died.
300 mass shootings so far in 2022. How even the most hardened 2A supporter can be ok with that is a genuine curiosity.
We can't even have a holiday in this country.
And it is the fault of one and only one of our political parties.
It's been determined that this was a case where a "Red Flag" warning could have prevented this carnage - there were ample circumstances in his past that became known that would have labeled him a danger. One of the problems that exists in those circumstances is the protection given to such potential killers by their parents and relatives.
LINK ->
Although arguments are made that "guns don't kill people", people with guns DO kill people and not enough is done to earmark those who have the possibility of doing so.