Five Shot Outside Dunbar High After Basketball Game

By Marcus Gilmer in News on Jan 10, 2009 4:50PM

A gang-related drive-by shooting late Friday night on the campus of Paul Laurence Dunbar Vocational Career Academy (3000 S. King Dr.) left five young men hurt, two critically. A sixth victim, a teenage girl, was injured when she was trampled on by people fleeing the scene. The injured were taken to University of Chicago Comer Children's Hospital, Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Mercy Hospital and Medical Center, and John H. Stroger Jr. Hospital of Cook County. The shooting happened outside of the Dunbar gym, where students were beginning to filter out of a game between Dunbar and John Hope College Prep that had gone into overtime. Eye witness accounts reported somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 to 12 shots fired from a passing SUV. According to CPD spokeswoman Monique Bond, none of the injured were believed to be students at Dunbar.

Chicago Police Supt. Jody Weis was on the scene and said, "These people drove up and fired into the crowd. We've got some positive leads." Weis added that over 200 police officers were in the area searching for clues and/or suspects. As of this morning, no suspects were in custody. Bond added, "This is possibly something that involves several schools and is not just isolated to Dunbar." School officials have turned over video surveillance taken around the school to the police. One student reported seeing a silver truck and a black car pull up to the school, said the people inside the cars pretended they were shooting, and then, "they really started shooting."

If there's any good news, hospital officials say none of the injuries are life-threatening and officials from both the University of Chicago Comer Children's Hospital and Mercy Hospital and Medical Center said the injured at their locations (one at Children's, two at Mercy) would be treated and released today. [CBN, S-T, NBC5]