Child shot in head, critically wounded in Back of the Yards

The boy was sitting in a parked vehicle with his mother and two other children in the 5200 block of South Peoria Street when three males walked up and started shooting, according to Chicago police.

Chicago police investigate in the 5500 block of South Halsted Street after a 3-year-old boy was shot Oct. 13, 2019, in the 5200 block of South Peoria Street.

A 3-year-old boy was critically wounded in a shooting Sunday in the Back of the Yards on the South Side.

The child was sitting in a parked vehicle with his mother and two other children about 11:40 p.m. in the 5200 block of South Peoria Street when three males walked up and started shooting, according to Chicago police.

The boy was shot in the head, police said. His mother drove to the 5500 block of South Halsted Street, where she flagged down an unmarked Chicago police car.

The child was driven to Comer Children’s Hospital, where he was listed in critical condition, police said. Police initially reported that the victim was a girl.

Officers could be seen investigating a car blocked off with crime scene tape at a gas station at Halsted and Garfield Boulevard. The car had bullet damage to the rear passenger’s side, where a window was shattered near a child’s car seat.

About a dozen shell casings could be seen in the street on Peoria near 52nd Street.

The boy’s family members were gathered at Comer Children’s Hospital. The child’s uncle and older brother both said they expected him to be OK.

His uncle, 45-year-old Wesley Lambert, said he had just gone to bed at his home in Gary, Indiana when his mom woke him up saying the boy was shot.

“I thought it was a dream,” he said.

Chicago police and a University of Chicago Medicine spokeswoman couldn’t provide an update on the boy’s condition Monday night, but when reached by phone, Lambert said his nephew was stable at the hospital.

No one is in custody as Area Central detectives investigate.