The alleged getaway driver in a gang-related shooting that injured two girls as they played in a sandbox at Avondale Park was ordered held without bail Thursday.
Dionisio Gonzalez’s actions allowed gunman Antonio Bucio to fire on June 8, 2011, and as a result, two “kids took the bullets,” Cook County Judge Maria Kuriakos Ciesil said.
Kuriakos Ciesil described Gonzalez as a “danger to himself and society.”
After the shooting in which a 2-year-old suffered a graze wound to her head and a 7-year-old was shot in her back, Chicago Police Supt. Garry McCarthy declared war on the Maniac Latin Disciples.
“We’re going to obliterate that gang,” McCarthy told police brass that summer. “Every one of their locations has to get blown up until they cease to exist.”
Bucio and Gonzalez are members of the Maniac Latin Disciples and were targeting two Latin King rivals in the 3500 block of West School, Assistant State’s Attorney Kim Przekota said Thursday in court.
Bucio, who was in a maroon van with Gonzalez and four others, jumped out, took out a .45-caliber handgun and fired at the men he had just exchanged gang signs with, Przekota said.
Bucio didn’t strike the men, ages 18 and 26. Instead, he shot the girls.
Bucio jumped back into the van and Gonzalez drove away, Przekota said.
Gonzalez eventually parked the car in the 2800 block of Francisco and ran away, Przekota said. Bucio hid the gun under a seat.
Bucio and Gonzalez were identified by witnesses but at the time, only Bucio was arrested shortly after the van was stopped by officers who later learned that it was the vehicle involved in the shooting, prosecutors said.
Bucio admitted he pulled the trigger, because the two Latin Kings he and his friends encountered had “disrespected his gang.”
Police sought Gonzalez at his old addresses but later learned he had left the Chicago area. A no-bail arrest warrant was issued that summer.
Florida authorities returned Gonzalez to Chicago this week after they learned he was wanted for the high-profile shooting when he was arrested for possession of cannabis and resisting arrest.
Gonzalez, 35, who is facing attempted murder and aggravated battery charges, has a weapons-related conviction from 2010.
Bucio, 27, pleaded guilty to attempted murder was sentenced in May to 30 years in prison.
