Gun used in 2 Rogers Park homicides linked to new shootings on West Side

The weapon used in two high-profile murders in Rogers Park has been linked to two additional shootings on the West Side, according to police.

The murders, 36 hours apart, of Eliyahu Moscowitz, an Orthodox Jew, and Douglass Watts, who was gay, set the North Side neighborhood on edge in the Fall of 2018, sparking fears of a loose killer bent on hate crimes.

Two weeks after the fatal shootings, the same gun was used in a drive-by in Lawndale on the West Side, Chicago police said. Someone using the gun wounded two men stopped in a vehicle at a stoplight shortly before midnight on Oct. 15, 2018 in the 4300 block of West Fifth Avenue, police said. The men, ages 23 and 27, were treated for gunshots to the arm and hand.

The gun was used again several months later on March 28, 2019 on the Near West Side, police said. No one was hit when someone fired shots from a vehicle at three building security guards in the 2300 block of West Jackson Boulevard, according to police.

The vehicle had entered the driveway to enter the building about 12:55 a.m., and then backed out before someone inside started shooting, police said. The bullets damaged property, but didn’t hit anyone, police said. No arrests were reported.

Ballistic tests showed the same gun was used in all four shootings, although it was unclear how many people had used that same gun, police said. No arrests have been announced in the murders of Moscowitz and Watts.

“Everything is still being actively investigated by detectives,” police said in a statement. “We cannot comment on any specifics related to the open investigations.”

Police and community groups offered a $150,000 reward — the largest in the city’s history — for information leading to the gunman in the Rogers Park killings.

Watts, 73, was shot at point blank range the morning of Sept. 30, 2018 as he walked his dog just steps from his home in the 1400 block of West Sherwin Avenue. Moscowitz, 24, was gunned down on a lakefront path about a day and a half later near Lunt Avenue as he played Pokemon Go on this phone.

Police released surveillance video that showed the suspected shooter jogging down an alley and sidewalk just minutes after Watts was shot. At the time, police said the motive behind the shootings remained unknown. Police said they thought the shooter lived in the neighborhood because he left each scene on foot.

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